Near Absolute Zero..Light?

[psynapse]

I remember hearing that in conditions near absolute zero the speed of light slows down so much you could over take a laser beam on a skateboard. Now how can this be if he speed of light is constant and should apear to be traveling at c in all frames of reference. How does the temperature affect c? Is this even a plausible scenerio?

[BigMoosie]

Light travels slower through materials with different refractive indexes, I can't remember the reason, but I'm pretty sure that temperature has nothing to do with it.

[JustStuit]

Considering it gets close to absolute zero in space, I would say that is incorrect. Plus it makes no sense

[insane_alien]

light only appears to slow down when it passes through materials anyway. this is because the photons are being absorbed by the atoms and then re-emitted. between the atoms the photons travel at c. light never slows down its instantaneous velocity, merely its average velocity.

[5614]

It does have nothing to do with temperature. i_a's explanation (above) is correct.

 

Back in 2000 scientists stopped light:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn340

[Klaynos]

It does have nothing to do with temperature. i_a's explanation (above) is correct.

 

Back in 2000 scientists stopped light:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn340

 

There are temperature dependent refractive indexies though.

 

v (average velocity) = c/n

 

Where n can be a function of temperature.

[swansont]

Back in 2000 scientists stopped light:

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn340

 

Oh, come now, you know better. They stored information about the light. "Stopped light" is the stuff of tabloids. (as is any mention of Star Trek in an article on quantum teleportation)

 

"in the light stopping experiment, the information is contained in the electromagnetic fields of the light beam and is transferred to the state of the gas atoms."

[bascule]

The CMBR is slightly above absolute zero yet still plodding on at c

[Klaynos]

The CMBR is slightly above absolute zero yet still plodding on at c

 

Because it's not being absorbed and reemitted all the damn time the medium it's passing through mostly, n=1

[5614]

Oh, come now, you know better.

Well, I would say if New Scientist say it then it's good enough, but no, you are right... I do know better, I just worded it a bit very badly.

[Ragib]

New Scientist isnt actually that good you know, i find real journals like Physics is reliable.

[psynapse]

I don't know why I didn't think of how silly that really sounds when I read it. Thanks for the informative replies. (as usual:-p )

[Klaynos]

New Scientist isnt actually that good you know, i find real journals like Physics is reliable.

 

Aiming at completly differnt audiances.

[Ragib]

o i guess, but isnt that what makes the difference? seperates the pros from the amatuers