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Quantum Breakthrough: Scientists Discover First One-Dimensional Topological Insulator
(scitechdaily.com)
this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2024
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Can anyone ELI5?
From what I gather, past insulator discoveries allowed electron flow in three or two dimensions, but this new discovery only allows flow in one dimension. I think of it like plumbing, where you have a tee, and the water (electrons) travel through the pipe in three directions (dimensions). Restricting the flow of electrons allows for better focus/flow, which makes for more precise electronic engineering methods.
An EE might be able to elaborate better than my crappy plumbing analogy.
Sort of, yeah. As I read it, in a regular conductor, electrons move around on the surface basically however they want. But we developed a process where on a 2D conductor, like a piece of aluminum foil, we could get the electrons to only move along the edges. Now they've extended that where, by making helical (spiral spring-shaped) strands of tellurium, they can make the electrons flow directionally along those helices. There's a pretty good illustration from the authors of the paper in the article.
If people say this is applicable to stuff like quantum computing and solar panels, I believe them, but I don't know enough to say how or why.