A lot is undiscovered when it comes to the nitty-gritty of fluid mechanics, but researchers know a little more now about superfluid than they did a few years ago.
When Helium misses a neutron, it forms a rare isotope known as Helium-3. This isotope becomes a superfluid when subjected to extremely low temperatures. Superfluids have no viscosity so they lose no kinetic energy, and Helium-3 gets similar properties like no friction for moving objects.
Despite the frictionless environment, it was believed the objects passing through Helium-3 would be subjected to speed limits. Specifically critical Landau velocity, a speed limit beyond which superfluid would be destroyed. However, experiments at Lancaster showed that Landau velocity might not be a strict rule for all superfluid as the objects surpassed this speed and didn’t destroy the fragile state of superfluidity in doing so.
Fast-forward a couple of years and now Lancaster University may have an answer for this phenomenon. Scientists believe this lack of a speed limit might be due to exotic particles sticking to all surfaces inside the superfluid. The discovery is of great importance as may guide the development and application of quantum technology, including quantum computing.
The Helium-3 superfluid in this experiment was cooled to 1/10th value of absolute zero which is about 0.0001K or -273.15°C. They moved a wire through the substance at a high speed in order to shake away the bound particles. They found the force required to do so was zero.
Lead author Dr SamuliAtti found the lack of resistance “very intriguing.” Ash Jennings, a PhD student involved in the study, concluded that the rod (wire) must be hidden from the superfluid because of the bound particles. Therefore, the objects can move at extremely high speeds without destroying the superfluid.
The results of this study were published in the journal Nature Communications. It is being considered by multiple research groups now and they aim to utilise these exotic particles for applications in quantum computing. Due to the vortices formed in a superfluid, some have called it a ‘quantum storm’ to the infinite possibilities of quantum research.