Light's Simultaneous Particle and Wave Nature Caught on Camera First Time

A clever scientific twist has allowed researchers to see the dual nature of light for the first time ever.

Albert Einstein had showed the existence of particle nature of light a.k.a. the Photon, at a time when only the wave nature of light was known. While Einstein was awarded the Nobel for discovering the dual nature of light, no experiments until now have been able to demonstrate this duality at the same time. Experiments have shown either light behaving as a well or particles at different times, reports Discovery News.

According to IB Times, researchers from Ecole Poytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Switzerland shot light at a metallic nano-wire to create a standing light wave. They then fired electrons close to the wire. These electrons helped reveal the dual nature of light.

The location on wire where the electron speeds changed on interaction with light, showed the wave nature while the changes in electron quantum energies which can only be a consequence of interaction particles, demonstrated the particle nature of light. Researchers visualized the phenomenon with an ultra fast electron microscope and produced a photograph.

"This experiment demonstrates that, for the first time ever, we can film quantum mechanics - and its paradoxical nature - directly. Being able to image and control quantum phenomena at the nanometer scale like this opens up a new route towards quantum computing," says Fabrizio Carbon, who led the research study, in a news release.