U.S. scientists use carbon nanotubes to create the smallest incandescent lamp

American scientists used a carbon nanotube to create the world's smallest incandescent lamp filament length of 1.4 microns, width of 13 nm.

The Chris Regan team at the University of California in the United States, a palladium and gold electrodes are attached to both ends of carbon nanotubes, carbon nanotubes through a small hole in a silicon chip, was placed in a vacuum. When an electric current passes through a carbon nanotube, the carbon nanotube is heated and starts to glow, releasing millions of photons per second. Reagan said: "in this way, we can easily see the light, the human eye is very sensitive to a single photon, but this lamp is not suitable for reading. "

Scientists have created the world's smallest incandescent lamp, which is used primarily as a "bridge" - the incompatibility between the theory of thermodynamics and quantum mechanics in physics.

The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy increases over time, but in quantum mechanics, time is not one-way, and it does not increase entropy, either before or after you move. So, how to transition from quantum mechanics to thermodynamics?

Reagan pointed out: "this carbon nanotube filament can be used to explain this point. It's big enough to apply the laws of thermodynamics. But it is small enough to be considered as a molecule or a quantum mechanical system. "

The team used it to verify the Planck blackbody radiation law". The law assumes a blackbody (blackbody is an ideal radiator, can absorb radiation energy, all the energy and no reflection wavelength through thermal radiation releases) may be random. For example, a hot incandescent lamp releases a number of photons of different colors, which together form a white light. For more than 100 years, Planck's hypothesis has supported the development of quantum mechanics.

However, because the nanotube filament can be regarded as a quantum mechanical system, Reagan believes that it may not comply with this rule, compared with the larger filament, the photons it releases may not be so arbitrary.

Reagan said: "quantum mechanics is applied to systems with very few particles, and thermodynamics is applied to very large particles. We do not have a theory that can be applied to the middle area, the light bulb gives us a chance. "

Using carbon nanotubes to create the smallest incandescent lamp