A remarkable Israeli scientific breakthrough could reshape the future of computing and communication. Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science have developed a pioneering technique that allows them to manipulate and track changes in materials at attosecond speeds so fast, light itself travels less than the width of a hydrogen atom in that time. 

This discovery, led by Prof. Nirit Dudovich from the Department of Physics of Complex Systems, promises to unlock next-generation processors and quantum devices capable of operating at light speed. 

“Once we know how to trace the ‘journey’ of individual electrons between energy levels in a material, we can use light to deliberately and precisely change the properties of that material in mere hundreds of attoseconds,” explained Dudovich. 

These changes could mean shifting a material from being a conductor to an insulator, or altering its transparenc all on demand. Until now, capturing such transformations in real-time had been impossible due to their lightning-fast nature. 

The key to the breakthrough lies in a novel dual-laser approach. One laser, made of longer pulses, initiates changes within the material. Simultaneously, an ultra-short attosecond pulse acts as a high-speed camera, capturing the effects with microscopic accuracy. The result is a real-time map of how electrons respond to light an achievement akin to building a navigation system for the quantum world.

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