Interesting observation of infinitesimal vortices in light waves that are faster than light. They aren't light, but holes in light. Since they aren't particles or waves they aren't constrained by the speed of light.
"Is Darkness Faster than Light?" |
Technion (https://www.technion.ac.il/en/blog/article/is-darkness-faster-than-light/)
QuoteA research group from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology reports in Nature an unprecedented achievement in electron microscopy: the direct measurement of "dark points" within light waves. By doing so, they were able to confirm a prediction from the 1970s that the speed of these points exceeds the speed of light.
[. . .]
The "dark points" measured by the group are essentially tiny "holes" in the wave structure. Known as vortices, the holes are a common phenomenon in nature: we encounter them in ocean waves, in air currents, and even in coffee when we stir it or pour it into the sink. As early as the 1970s, a surprising theoretical prediction was proposed: vortices may move faster than the wave in which they are formed. As strange as it sounds – imagine a vortex in a river overtaking the flow of water in which it exists – the phenomenon is real. Until now, this was based on theory. The research team's achievement has now confirmed it experimentally.
So what exactly are these entities? According to the Technion researchers, these light vortices are "zero points," or "nulls," within light waves – locations where the wave's amplitude drops to zero. In simpler terms, they are points of complete darkness embedded within the light field.
As noted, this phenomenon was predicted in the 1970s as a direct result of random wave interference, and many attempts have since been made to demonstrate it experimentally. The Technion team's success is based on the construction of a unique microscopy system at the Technion's Electron Microscopy Center. By integrating a laser system with an advanced opto-mechanical setup into a specialized electron microscope, the researchers achieved record-breaking temporal and spatial resolution.
The vortices (dark points) were measured in a specific material (hBN), prepared by Prof. Hanan Herzig Sheinfux of Bar-Ilan University. In this material, light waves become special "light-sound" waves (polaritons). These can be thought of as light waves that move unusually slowly, about 100 times slower than the speed of light in a vacuum, or as sound waves that move unusually fast. It is within these "slowed" waves that light vortices can "leap" and exceed the speed of light.
[Continues . . . (https://www.technion.ac.il/en/blog/article/is-darkness-faster-than-light/)]
The paper (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10209-z) is behind a paywall, but I found the preprint version on arXiv. The abstract is quoted from the published version.
"Superluminal Correlations in Ensembles of Optical Phase Singularities" |
arXiv (https://arxiv.org/pdf/2509.17675)
QuoteAbstract:
Phase singularities—points carrying quantized topological charge—are universal features found across diverse wave systems from superfluids and superconductors to acoustic and optical fields. Ensembles of these singularities exhibit distance correlations resembling particles in liquids, extensively studied for their role in exotic material phases. By contrast, the full correlations in phase space that govern the system evolution have remained unexplored and experimentally inaccessible.
Here we directly measure the ultrafast dynamics of optical singularity ensembles, capturing their full phase-space correlations, presenting the joint distance–velocity distribution. Our observations show a breakdown of the particle-singularity analogy: phase singularities accelerate towards formally divergent velocities in the moment before annihilation, indicated by measurements of velocities exceeding the speed of light.
These apparent superluminal velocities are paradoxically amplified by the slow group velocity of hyperbolic phonon polaritons in our material platform, hexagonal boron nitride membranes. We demonstrate these phenomena using combined hardware and algorithmic advances in ultrafast electron microscopy, achieving spatial and temporal resolutions, each an order of magnitude below the polaritonic wavelength and cycle period. Our findings deepen our understanding of phase singularities and their universality, enabling to probe topological defect dynamics at previously unattainable timescales.
It was this paragraph that gave me pause:
The vortices (dark points) were measured in a specific material (hBN), prepared by Prof. Hanan Herzig Sheinfux of Bar-Ilan University. In this material, light waves become special "light-sound" waves (polaritons). These can be thought of as light waves that move unusually slowly, about 100 times slower than the speed of light in a vacuum, or as sound waves that move unusually fast. It is within these "slowed" waves that light vortices can "leap" and exceed the speed of light.
The dark points were moving faster than light that had been slowed down 100 times. Isn't this a bit like me saying that I can run faster than Usain Bolt, as long as Bolt has a several hundred pound backpack on while he is running?
As I understand it, no particle (or any other physical thing) can travel faster than light, regardless of the medium. The speed of light in a vacuum is the highest possible velocity in our Universe, but in any medium the speed of light remains the upper limit on velocity. The experiment used a medium through which light travels considerably slower so that they could make their observations.