In startling news scientists have somehow managed to reverse the direction of time, using a quantum computer.
Researchers working with a quantum computer used subatomic particles and observed them travelling back in time, appearing to break a cardinal rule of physics.
Their experiment defies the second law of thermodynamics – a rule of physics that governs the direction of events from the past to the future, with time running in one direction.
Negatively-charged electrons reordered themselves in their original order after being scattered.
The Russian scientists likened their achievement to hitting a triangle of balls racked up on a pool table, scattering them across the table haphazardly and having them reorder themselves in their original shape.
To an outside observer, it appears as if time is running backwards for the subatomic particles, achieving the equivalent of a “time machine.”
The “time machine” is a quantum computer using electron units of information called “qubits” which can be modified.
Lead researcher Dr Gordey Lesovik, who heads the Laboratory of the Physics of Quantum Information at the Moscow Institute of Physics & Technology (MIPT), said: “we have artificially created a state that evolves in a direction opposite to that of the thermodynamic arrow of time.”
The researchers expect the technique to improve in time, becoming more reliable and precise. Whether the quantum machine will look like Dr Who’s Tardis phone box remains to be seen.
