Outreach

An intervention at Radio France: Electronics at the speed of light

In a study published in Nature Physics: physicists have just demonstrated a new approach to controlling electrons with light. A European team, including researchers from Paris-Saclay, has induced electrons to move on a time scale of less than a femtosecond, i.e. less than a quadrillionth of a second. At present, our electronic components – based on silicon semiconductors – are activated in picoseconds – thousands of billions of seconds – a thousand times slower than a femtosecond. For years we have been trying to conduct electricity as quickly as possible. To achieve this, researchers have used laser pulses in particular: the idea is to use the ultra-fast light pulse to control the properties of the electrons. This is fundamental research – at the heart of one of the priority themes of the PALM lab – and it will take time to be able to apply these results. However, in the long term, this could push back the current limits of computer systems.

Interview with Marino Marsi, physicist at the Solids Physics Laboratory at the University of Paris Saclay, responsible for the Ultrafast theme. Work to which Andrei Borisov and Dana Codruta Marinica (ISMO) contributed.

A website on the physics of the Labex PALM

Discover all physics and physicists of PALM through a french/english website for public : www.AtomeLumiereMatiere.fr

You will find many resources to download for free : videos, posters, postcard, images, bookmarks… 

The Labex also supports several actions of popularization towards the general public, which can be found on the training/dissemination page.
For example, http://toutestquantique.fr/, a set of extension tools
for the PALM labex on Themes 1 (Elementary and correlated quantum systems)
and 3 (Ultra-fast dynamics: from radiation sources to multi-scale responses).

Animated film

Labex PALM supported the production of the animated film “The Hairy Nobel”. More information