Prompt Cast
The Quest for Absolute Zero: Exploring the Limits of Temperature
TLDR Absolute Zero, the temperature at which all particles stop moving, is an unattainable goal due to the increasing difficulty of cooling a system as it approaches this temperature. However, scientists have made significant progress in reaching extremely low temperatures, leading to important discoveries in physics and our understanding of the universe.
Timestamped Summary
00:00
Temperature has an absolute barrier that can never be broken, leading to attempts to achieve the impossible temperature of Absolute Zero.
01:32
Absolute Zero is defined as zero Kelvin, the temperature at which all particles in a system stop moving, and it is the absolute barrier that can never be crossed.
02:56
The closer you get to absolute zero, the more work is required to make the system even colder, and ultimately reaching absolute zero is impossible.
04:11
Liquid air, including liquid oxygen and nitrogen, was created in 1877 and 1883, respectively, reaching temperatures as low as 90 Kelvin and 77 Kelvin.
05:32
In 1898, hydrogen was liquefied, and in 1908, helium was finally liquefied at 4.222 Kelvin, which is close to absolute zero, and the physics at these temperatures start to get really weird.
07:00
Below 1K, there is a state of matter called a Bose-Einstein condensate, which was first created in 1995 and can theoretically reach temperatures as low as one pico-Calvin above absolute zero. On the other hand, there is a theoretical temperature known as the Planck temperature, which is 14,000 quintillion Kelvin, but ordinary matter cannot reach this temperature.
08:29
Reaching absolute zero is impossible, but getting close has led to significant advances in physics and our understanding of the universe.
