Scientists have broken the record for coldest temperatures

Scientists have surpassed the record for the coldest temperature ever measured in a laboratory: they dropped magnetized gas 120 meters from the tower and reached a temperature of 38 trillion degrees Celsius above -273.15 Celsius.

A team of German researchers studied the so-called fifth level quantum properties: Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a gas derivative that exists only in the ultracolt state. At the BEC stage, matter begins to act like a large atom, making it an attractive topic for quantum physicists particularly interested in the dynamics of particles. Temperature is a measure of molecular vibration: the higher the set of molecules moving, the higher the overall temperature. Thus, zero is the point at which all molecular motions stop – minus 273.15 degrees Celsius. Scientists have developed a special scale for very low temperatures called the Kelvin scale, where zero corresponds to absolute Kelvin.

As we approach zero, strange things begin to happen. For example, according to a 2017 study published in the journal Nature Physics, light actually becomes a liquid that can be poured into a container. According to a 2017 study published in the journal Nature Communications, supercooled helium stops friction at extremely low temperatures. At NASA’s Cold Atomic Laboratory, researchers found atoms in two locations simultaneously.

In this record-breaking experiment, scientists captured a cloud containing approximately 100,000 atoms in a magnetic field inside a vacuum chamber. They then cooled the room to 2 degrees Celsius to 2 billion degrees above absolute zero, which would be a world record.

But it’s not cool enough for researchers who want to push the boundaries of physics; To be even cooler, they need to simulate deep space conditions. Thus, the team placed their installation in the Bremen Tower of the European Space Agency, the Center for Micro Gravity Research at the University of Bremen in Germany. By reducing the vacuum chamber to free fall, by quickly turning the magnetic field on and off, BEC allows it to float without retreating by gravity, which reduces the molecular motion of rubidium atoms to almost zero. As a result, BEC set an all-time record of 38 picochelins – 38 trillion kelvin – in about 2 seconds. Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder, Colorado, achieved the previous record of 36 ppm Kelvin using special beams. The coldest known natural site in the universe is the Boomerang Nebula, located in the constellation Centaurus, about 5,000 light-years from Earth. According to the European Space Agency, its average temperature is -272 C (about 1 Kelvin).