Researchers use semiconductors to set speed limit on light

In a nod to scientific paradox, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have slowed light down in an effort to speed up network communication.

They have shown for the first time that the group velocity of light - the speed at which a laser pulse travels along a light wave - can be slowed to about 6 miles per second in semiconductors. While that speed is not exactly the pace of a turtle, it is 31,000 times slower than the 186,000 miles (or 300 million meters) per second that light normally clocks while traveling through a vacuum.

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All News summaries for September 28, 2004