• For the first time, Harvard researchers have created similar wakes of light-like waves moving on a metallic surface, called surface plasmons, and demonstrated that they can be controlled and steered.
  • Surface plasmons are confined to the surface of a metal. In order to create wakes through them, Capasso’s team designed a faster-than-light running wave of charge along a one-dimensional metamaterial — like a powerboat speeding across a lake.
  • This research addresses a particularly elegant and innovative problem in physics which connects different physical phenomena, from water wakes to sonic booms, and Cherenkov radiation.

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