How To Go Faster Than Light Speed (Seriously…)
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Nothing can travel faster than light - in a vacuum. But when light slows down, sometimes matter can blaze past that speed limit, creating a stunning glow called Cherenkov radiation. We can see this glow in a nuclear reactor as high-energy particles speed by. It offers us a window into a realm of the universe that is usually invisible to us.
Filmed at the J. J. Pickle Research Campus at the University of Texas at Austin
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0:00 A strange blue glow
1:24 How to slow light down
3:19 The right way to think about light
5:41 How to make a photonic boom
7:51 Who discovered this?
8:25 Why this matters
9:45 Extras!
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Nuclear reactors are cool. This might be the coolest thing about them. Thanks for watching! I hope I've earned your like and subscription. If you'd like to help me make videos like this one, check out the link to the Patreon in the description!
@pyeitme508
Жыл бұрын
Ha ha
@gastonpossel
Жыл бұрын
I mean, nuclear reactors are the exact opposite of cool... they're hot! that's the whole idea XD
@meinkamph5327
Жыл бұрын
Tacobell has the ability to travel faster then light speed.......
@christianheichel
Жыл бұрын
If neutrinos are producing Cherenkov radiation, they should be losing speed. Where are all the slow neutrinos? Why haven't we found them?
@linkonmazumdar8155
Жыл бұрын
Sometimes I wonder why I watch these videos Most of the informations goes above my head 😂 but still these attract me and yeah I love biological videos rather than physics 🙃
Gotta love how Joe just casually sits atop a nuclear reactor
@maxwyght1840
Жыл бұрын
Why would that be an issue? Nuclear power is perfectly safe, and with that volume of water, the background radiation is much higher than what's coming from the reactor.
@maksphoto78
Жыл бұрын
@@maxwyght1840 It's not perfectly safe, but yeah, water is blocking the radiation here.
@maxwyght1840
Жыл бұрын
@@maksphoto78 people swim those pools all the time to perform maintenance. So yeah, it's perfectly safe. As long as it wasn't built by communists.
@mandelbraught2728
Жыл бұрын
Lol exactly. I was worried through the whole video that he was gonna fall in. Lol. I can't tell if it was just the way it was filmed, but could someone fall in there?!
@nguyennam1945
Жыл бұрын
This is small nuclear reactor, for test so it not much radiation, also water is the best shield
As a particle physicist, I appreciate this video. Cherenkov radiation can be used to measure the speed of a high energy particle traveling through a medium as well as to distinguish types of particles such as electron vs muon.
@prateekkarn9277
Жыл бұрын
The muons just existing cuz of time dilation?
@thomasciarlariello3228
Жыл бұрын
Cosmic ray muons are from economic necessity given how expensive particle accelerators are even if Inai has a Japanese patent on ground based muon particle beams to supply rocket engines in flight so for relativistic spaceflights a ship and crew would turn into meson particles to sink into gravity wells and burst with force of a supernova.
@ThiagoFer93
Жыл бұрын
Just a random question of someone that isn't physicist: If Cherenkov radiation is the "echo" of the light of a high energy particle and can be used to measure the speed of that particle, why can't we break the uncertainty principle with it? Measuring it's position and then using the "echo" to determine its speed?
@see8chsee
Жыл бұрын
@@ThiagoFer93 No physical quantity can be measured with 100% precision. You can measure the position and the momentum, just cannot do it precise enough simultaneously to break the uncertainty principle.
@rosyidharyadi7871
Жыл бұрын
does it work for neutral particles? because from the explanation from the video, it seems like it has something to do with its electric charge as well.
to anyone wondering how joe is still safe; the water between him the the rods is protecting him, even if he was in the water he would be alright, there's more than actually needed, to be extra safe
@Gamertaque
Жыл бұрын
True water blocks radiation very well, why else is water inside space stations’ walls but to protect you inside, ask any person at nasa about radiation in space and the answer is just water, except the janito ofc
@threemooseqateers9689
Жыл бұрын
Hot tub :D
@vaingloriant
Жыл бұрын
@@threemooseqateers9689 Forbidden hot tub
@jackwastakenx2
3 ай бұрын
@@vaingloriantbut not cuz radioactivity, you just ain’t allowed cuz it’ll make the water dirty (also it’s more a cool tub)
This is why I quite like 'Speed of Causality' for light speed in a vacuum. I think its clearer, or at least gets people asking the right questions.
@ultraawakening4328
Жыл бұрын
I agree 👍
@CheatOnlyDeath
Жыл бұрын
True. My car can go faster than a Lamborghini... through a car wash.
@DarthVaderfr
Жыл бұрын
@@CheatOnlyDeath i can go faster than any airplane, if we are both in water
@scottmacs
Жыл бұрын
Yes!
@dowesschule
Жыл бұрын
That‘s why it‘s called c, right?
I've seen the Cherenkov effect myself, on top of a pool of water with a small reactor core below too. It's beautiful. But I thought it had to do with neutrons shooting into the water, so you've corrected this mistake in my mind. Thank you. A shockwave of light, that's awesome!
@Leboybandent
Жыл бұрын
I think that happens too. Like at the IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica...
@gastonpossel
Жыл бұрын
@@Leboybandent I was thinking about neutrons, not neutrinos. Anyway, that is interesting, since I understood from the video that the effect is caused by charged particles.
@Leboybandent
Жыл бұрын
@@gastonpossel Oh I misread.. but yeah that is interesting.. need to look up how the emission from the neutrons passing through water happens!
@MrMan20
11 ай бұрын
Photonic wave
@bsadewitz
10 ай бұрын
@@Leboybandent "Neutrinos are detected in water Cherenkovs when they interact by W exchange, converting into the equivalent charged lepton (muon or electron for νμ or νe respectively), or when they elastically scatter off electrons (when the recoil electron can be detected)."
Cherenkov radiation in a spent fuel pool is genuinely one of the most beautiful things ive seen, truly unforgettable
@dieseltechie7830
Жыл бұрын
It's also one of the most horrifying. Considering you're talking about spent fuel that means we can't use it's energy for anything useful anymore even breeding useful material through neutron bombardment. It's still way too energetic to just store without active cooling & supervision & even after the blue glow disappears we have to store it far enough from anything it could possibly contaminate and spread to affect the environment for longer than all of human history.
@mycosys
Жыл бұрын
@@dieseltechie7830 Wow, that is utterly untrue. Spent fuel from traditional reactors is actually about 5% consumed. There is enough energy in 'spent' fuel reserves to power humanity for about 500+ years with more efficient reactors. The best and ONLY practical way we have to get rid of nuclear fuel waste is fast neutron reactors. Why didnt we use them in the first place? they dont produce enough of the nuclear waste they wanted to make weapons.
@draghettis6524
Жыл бұрын
@@mycosys And when the technology was finally explored, anti-nuclear activists were not happy, for some reason. Like, here in France we had two, Phénix and Superphénix, two prototypes of fast neutron reactors, and inarguably two successes. During its construction, Superphénix was the target of an unclaimed terrorist attack. With a rocket launcher. It was shut down in 1997, despite a stellar 1996, because of the "ecologists"
@CraftyF0X
Жыл бұрын
@@mycosys That's not entirely correct reasoning, fast spectrum reactors are perfectly capable to produce weapon material via breeding. Matter in fact they are much better at it than the commercially used moderated reactors, because those don't necessary need fuel reprocessing or at least not as extensive to acces the materials.
When I was a kid, my friend Todd used to steal Red Bull from his dad and we would ride our bikes faster than the speed of light. We had fun observing the relativistic effects as our velocity increased. Time always seemed to fly by. We'd get started in the afternoon, and by the time we got home, dinner had been over 40 years ago. Those were good times.
@SuperMarioOddity
Жыл бұрын
I thought red bull gave you wings, not bike powers?
@melissaleigh8019
3 ай бұрын
fr fr i can relate
@masterroyale6923
2 ай бұрын
@funkytrickster618 It’s the new line of Redbull they released, didn’t you hear?
@GregJumpscare
2 ай бұрын
@@SuperMarioOddity red bull breaks realityyyyy~
@tetzy3882
Ай бұрын
This read like a quote from a novelist
I absolutely love that you also showcase how chill you can be around a nuclear reactor. Yes, it's small, but ALSO it's built such that you can absolutely sit right there and be perfectly fine, even if you did fall in. I'm also giggling a lot, because the first time I learned about Cherenkov radiation was after it was mentioned a little (possibly infamous) article called "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex" by Larry Niven...
@singularityscan
Жыл бұрын
You can showcase getting a lethal dose of radiation while remaining absolutely chill 😂 Filming it without camera distortion is harder though.
@jackwastakenx2
3 ай бұрын
@@singularityscanwell it’s still not lethal in most cases; I’ve been to a reactor; I’m not even in university/college
this is sure the best time to be living in, just think how much information we normal people have access to, which would be a dream for a scientists back then, thank you for explaining such a complex thing in a very easy way
Great video, Dr. Joe!!! Just one thing: at 8:27 it's implied that you can use Cherenkov radiation to detect neutrinos, but technically neutrinos can't produce Cherenkov radiation because they have no charge. The neutrino has to decay in other particles in order to be able to produce Cherenkov radiation.
@tomlxyz
3 ай бұрын
You can use it for neutrinos, in that case muons or electrons are first created which in turn do have a charge and thus it can be detected the same way
Superbly well explained. Well done😊
Pretty enlightening.
Thank you so much! I have said this before but everything having to do with light/EM-radiation and colours and wave-physics is my all favourite! I had heard all the false explanations before and realized that they couldn't be true but never knew the true explanation, thanks again for that! And what a great addition it was to talk about the Cherenkov detector used to study the cosmic high-energy particles. Keep up the good work Joe and team
One of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Going to a nuclear power plant while studying Physics at university. Cherenkov radiation makes all the water light up. Really magical.
Great, just great visuals. Thank you for the constant quality!!
I love these quirks of physics!
@tri-ify8852
Жыл бұрын
Wait how was this 2 days ago
@rykehuss3435
Жыл бұрын
Its not a quirk of physics. Light is not decelerating
@mycosys
Жыл бұрын
quark quirks!
@Petriefied0246
Жыл бұрын
@@tri-ify8852 Patreon innit.
@Petriefied0246
Жыл бұрын
@@rykehuss3435 light changing speed when it changes medium is a quirk of physics.
Thanks for giving me that '"click" Oh, I get it now!' moment. Such a great feeling
@besmart
Жыл бұрын
The best!
This is really cool! I knew about Cherenkov detectors (although not necessarily by that name) and how they give off light when particles pass through the water, but I'd never had a detailed explanation of *how* and *why*!
9:41 as a fellow dude i can confirm we all wanted to jump into it
I'd need to watch it twice or even thrice to understand it better. Also the analogies were great especially the duck going at turbo speed and the ripples behind it bunching together. Something just clicked in my head then. (English is not my native language so my bad if something feels off in my wording) I love these videos.
@gavinhicks7621
Жыл бұрын
Your English is amazing! I wish I could speak more languages. As an American, foreign languages aren’t taught well here. I know most other places teach a few languages throughout all of their schooling. In America, we touch on Spanish a couple times and move on.
The reason my brain isnt hurting is because youve done an excellent job at explaining it
This was an excellent explanation of light and Cherenkov radiation!
Excellent video. It's astonishing how you (all of you, include the animators!) succeed to explain such complicated issues.
I think we should call it a superluminal shock wave, it sound cooler than photonic boom, and its also a better description of what is actually happening
A video on neutrino detection would be awesome! Great video btw.
Such an amazing episode!
9:35 what did he say? Shedding light. Oh. Shedding. That's not what I heard at first.
I’d love to see a collaboration with Be Smart and PBS space time.
So clearly explained! Thanks 🙂
You have the most amazingly good job - and you're incredibly good at it too. Staying curious.
That's the warp core
This video has the best clickable but not clickbait title in the history of KZread! It's immensely provocative and on its face, seems easily disprovable and yet it's 100% accurate and scientifically provable. Prodigious! You are clearly a man of sagacity and wit. 😎
I'd love it for Joe to explain more about microcurrent in a longer form video! The foreo bear explaination was wonderful
Great video. I had no idea this is how Neutrino detectors work.
At 6:02 the positive partial charges of water are at the hydrogen atoms. Wouldn't the molecules turn their positive parts (hydrogen) to the passing electron (which is negative).
Like the video, one quick correction would be the graphic at 6:00 is slightly off, the positive end of water is the hydrogens, so that's the thing that would be attracted to the negative electron, not the oxygen as is shown.
Finally needed a tutorial on this.
Learned so much from this video. Thanks.
This Danish lady professor slowed down light so much you could walk past it, Joe. I don't think this is what people have in mind when they talk about "traveling" faster than the speed of light 😀
I like that since it's 2023 it's completely acceptable to casually use stock death metal music in your science education video
@besmart
Жыл бұрын
Oh I've been droppin' death metal stings since at least 2019
@_mmuffe_3079
Жыл бұрын
We only need more stock death metal in science education :))
@CorporateNothing
Жыл бұрын
@@besmart oh you know what you're right LOL
Wanted to know that thanks, actually much more straight forward than I expected
Thanks for this bro.
But Joe, nothing can travel faster than the speed of light!
@Crausy
Жыл бұрын
I see what you did there...
sience like this always gets me hyped up like a jet turbine
Whoa dude. Youre blowing my mind right now
Great video, that glow is so cool and now I have a better idea of how those giant detectors work.
Imaging going faster than light speed and not even be able to flex about breaking the laws of physics
@rykehuss3435
Жыл бұрын
Light does not decelerate. Its still traveling at c, even in water. It just takes more time since the photons are constantly being absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms of said medium.
Hey! Great video! I have 2 questions: 1. In the portion where you explain Cherenkov radiation with electrons (5:58 to 6:25) the water molecules are re-orienting themselves due to the electric field the electron is giving off. I was just wondering whether the re-orientation of the water molecules was correct, since the e- is negative, and the water molecule being polar, the positive side (Hydrogen side) would be facing the e- as it went by. In the video the negative side of the water (2 pairs of e- on the O) face the e- as it goes by. Let me know if I am wrong or if it is due to other facotrs, such as the magnetic field the moving charge produces, or perhaps the field the e- produces is very small compared to the field the other water molecules produce and so it is a relativley small change etc. 2. Lastly, I don't fully understand why the neutrinos produce Cherenkov radiation. I understand the e- doing it, since it interacts with the Electromagnetic force with it's neighbours (water), producing EM waves. However, as you stated in the video, neutrinos don't interact electromagnetically (since they are neutral charge), therefore I don't see how they can produce light. Perhaps it is a different sort of Cherenkov radiation, produced by other mechanisms such as the weak force, which eventually produces EM waves (Cherenkov radiation) Many thanks, again great video I enjoyed it alot!
@NightBlazr_
2 ай бұрын
1. I think you're right. 2. "Neutrinos are detected in water Cherenkovs when they interact by W exchange, converting into the equivalent charged lepton (muon or electron for νμ or νe respectively), or when they elastically scatter off electrons (when the recoil electron can be detected)." I got this from another comment.
This is fascinating 👍
Just found your channel from the rainbow video and have commenced my weeklong binge of the backlog. Great stuff keep up the great work Joe!
Thanks for your sharing
One interesting thing to think about is that the Cherenkov effect in case of the nuclear reactor is due to the interaction of the charged particle and the water molecules and the subsequent "piling up of the ripples of light", then how do the Cherenkov detectors work in case of neutrinos which do not interact with matter? Actually, they DO interact with matter, albeit rarely. The neutrinos interact through weak force which is very short range. And since these neutrinos are high energy as well, one can imagine the rarity of these interactions.
To go faster than the speed of light you just need to be r34 artist
@joshuaosei5628
Жыл бұрын
I want to understand this, but something tells me it’s better I don’t
@Guru_1092
Жыл бұрын
@@joshuaosei5628 good intuition.
@lorenzoblum868
Жыл бұрын
The speed of darkness on steroids.
@ryangainey94
2 ай бұрын
@@joshuaosei5628 Rule 34: If it exists, there is porn of it. You can commission a "r34 artist" to create pornographic images of whatever you want. That being said, drawing pornographic matter going faster than the speed of light isn't the same thing as actually being faster than the speed of light, so I must admit I don't really understand what the joke is either, even though I know what a r34 artist is.
@joshuaosei5628
Ай бұрын
@@ryangainey94 Thanks for the explanation. I guess the joke was that people must be very quick to make the porn of that fandom or idea, and so they’re so fast they “go faster than the speed of light”
I just learned so much!
Great video thank you 🙏🏻
The trick is not going faster than c. The trick is slowing down light in water...
@MNSalty
Жыл бұрын
…………..god forbid they make a video to educate people that don’t know…………
@phoenixsmaug1568
Жыл бұрын
@@MNSalty Then maybe without such pathetic clickbait
@No_one_cares_about_Ukraine
Жыл бұрын
@@phoenixsmaug1568 agree
@spiguy
Жыл бұрын
@@phoenixsmaug1568 just 1:30 into the video he clarifies the meaning of the statement
@emreyurtseven23
Жыл бұрын
@@phoenixsmaug1568 Meeh it's ok if more people are going to learn because of it, I think
I feel clickbaited
amazing I never knew about this awesome!
WOW, EPIC video!!! Thank You!
The speed of light is already variable.
@wolvenar
Жыл бұрын
The speed of light != C C is not always equal in all space, as gravity affects the local constant, because all dimensions change and distort.
@user-ei1ym1lq6h
Жыл бұрын
My theory dwarfs all of the vaccum, constant & dimensional limitations. I can actually prove it with a small diagram, but ideally, I'd like to further test on a simulator.
@rykehuss3435
Жыл бұрын
@@wolvenar Wrong. The speed of light is always the same, even in mediums. It is not variable. Photons in water still travel at c, they just bump into atoms and get absorbed, re-emitted and then sent on their way. Photons cannot decelerate, anything with rest mass will ALWAYS travel at c. If you disagree then go ahead and disprove theory of special relativity.
@wolvenar
Жыл бұрын
@@rykehuss3435 You might want to find out what happens mathematically to C and all the dimensions as you approach a gravity well, now work that relative to a second observer from a position well away from the gravity well.
@rykehuss3435
Жыл бұрын
@@wolvenar Nothing happens to it. You might want to find out about general and special relativity.
A light-boom?🤔🧐 Makes sense. Also, I never new there was anything that could move faster than the speed of light. That’s pretty cool.
@crewgunnight8987
Жыл бұрын
Flash: am i a joke to u?
@badoem5353
Жыл бұрын
Actively, not cause the e= mc² But space could technically could be faster. Like light has no mass, space doesn't really need (added) energy to exist or accelerate. It's in homeostasis technically.
@pix23
Жыл бұрын
This idea intrigued me and I searched a bit, it seems the term used is "photonic boom". Although maybe "photonic flash" would better capture the redundancy present in the original term
I wish I had you as a science teacher! ❤
Great video!
Would the temperature of the water affect the color? I love how out of the entire spectrum it just happens to have the right energy to be bluish white instead of most of the spectrum being not visible.
@madonius
Жыл бұрын
No, at least not in the perceived wavelength. There is a correlation of refractive index and temperature and a correlation between the refractive index and the maximum frequency that is emitted. But this would have no effect in the perceived colour of the glow.
@davidroddini1512
Жыл бұрын
The charged particles are moving toward the top of the tank so the light is blue shifted. If you could see the particles moving downward through the water they would be red shifted since they are moving away from the observer. 😉
I simply just run really fast.
@lorenzoblum868
Жыл бұрын
Or take the shortcut.
Great video Thank you
Now that is fascinating!
Can't help but imagine you oops-ing right into that reactor.
Excellent video.
Thank you for teaching us about Cherenkov "thingies".
Today I learned more about light. Thank you.
I feel like more people need to see this just to understand how safe nuclear reactors are
The opening scene is soo satisfying...
thank's hank ❤
Fascinating!
Great video 👍😃.
The explanation is already very good and thorough for a short KZread video, but the effect that of the light slowing down in a medium is only almost right. Indeed the electromagnetic wave tugs on the (mostly) electrons in the material, which moves along with the light and therefore, being an oscillating charge, creates its own wave, called a polarization wave. But then, this newly created field doesn't "tug" on the other field, because ligth does not actually interact with light. Instead, basically create a moving interference pattern, which is the light we observe going through the medium. The reason that the final wave is slower than the speed of light in vacuum is that the electrons (and other charged particles) have mass and therefore don't respond instantly. So the polarization wave therefore laggs behind the original wave as well.
Like how you went full glowing Mr Burns at the end there! Lol
I like this 👍🏻👍🏻
Excellent work... I started this video thinking "'faster than light'? I don't (expletive deleted) think so!" and finished it thinking "Oh... so that's why neutrino detectors are in gigantic buckets of water".
Really like to watch your videos
Lol, you completely blew my mind. I thougt i was not possible
Nice.
That a channel like this has almost 5 million subscribers makes me happy
Of course matter travelling faster than the speed of light IS a tremendous teaser, but tbh... ...you already had me just with the cool, blue glow. 🤗
Thanks bro
Like a Shockwave with the speed of sound, but with the speed of light. Love it. Also love when you explain something and i get excited because it makes sense, then say "if your brain hurts right now its okay." When my brain isnt hurting!
Thank you for the great video,. One question: if we would put together an anode/catode system with the catode in air and the anode submerged into wafer, and we would accelerate electrons from the catode to the water/anode, would we see the Cherenkov radiation in the water? Provided of course that the electron speed is high enough. Or is this phenomenon only possible with nuclear reactors due to the very high energy demand for the electrons?
this is what i was searching for my teachers would n't be able to explain my curiosity hats off to Joe Thank you !
@BariumCobaltNitrog3n
Жыл бұрын
Nobody can explain curiosity.
@pratibhakumari4118
Жыл бұрын
@@BariumCobaltNitrog3n thankyou!! for letting me know this
@BariumCobaltNitrog3n
Жыл бұрын
@@pratibhakumari4118 Never stop being curious.
@pratibhakumari4118
Жыл бұрын
@@BariumCobaltNitrog3n I'll remember your wise words.
Thanks for shedding light on weird physics, Joe
Super Nice
Two things here, one the law of conservation seemingly is broken when light leaves the medium unless other light is absorbed and its em radiation slows down its neighbors. Also two at what rate does the em radiation "pulse" at? Since it's quantified this must mean it has pulses or does it just emit em radiation at each plank length?
Also worth mentioning the Askaryan effect. Very much related. Just as interesting.
the swan segment was good. this pleases me
Another great video. Thanks. However, I think your animation of an electron passing through a bunch of water molecules was slightly wrong. As the electron passed, you showed each molecule rotating so that its oxygen side was closer to the electron. I think the torque on the dipole would actually turn the hydrogen side towards the electron.
I had not understood the magnetic and electrical fields that make us light until seeing this video!
Your electric wave and magnetic wave animation isn't the line right. The magnetic and the electric are not at a maximum at the same time but rather are 90° skewed
Hi Joe. I had trouble finding papers discussing the efficacy of the type of medical device you recommended at the end of the video. Unfortunately my google foo is failing me today. Can you please give links to the sources you looked at when deciding to recommend this product.
What you did there is amazing, people that has a background will probably think that you're referring to the speed of causality until about 2 minutes in when they realized that you actually meant proper speed of light, you totally tricked me there, I was gonna argue