MIT and Havard scientists accidently create hard light.

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/09/29/mit-harvard-scientists-accidentally-create-real-life-lightsaber/?intcmp=latestnews

Yup, a group of scientists have discovered that light has states of matter like regular matter and solid happens to be one of them.  While the article just talks about lightsabers, it means that things like green lantern rings, force shields and holodecks are all possible as well.  Geeks of the world, rejoice!

[BlueBard]

I'm not so sure I'm ready to go where that article would like me to follow.

If I am understanding the gist of the results as presented by the article -- and I am no scientist -- they have basically shown that photons can be made to interact with each other as if they are solid. 

For me, I'm left wondering how these 'hard light' particles react with classical solid matter.  What is required to attain and then maintain that state? 

I'm guessing they're going to want to do more research and that any practical application is a long time off, if even possible.  I'm guessing they're likely to get the funding to do it.

I'm interested in learning more, but not ready to start saving up my money for a RL lightsaber.

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

Basically, they were bombarding light photons with laser beams when they accidentally got two photons to form a solid molecule.  Yeah, that article got obsessed over the lightsaber comparison.  There's a link to the Harvard Journal article in that one that is frankly better.

Anyway, these light molecules could indeed interact with normal matter while still retaining some properties of light.  They seem to think that projecting hard holograms is doable, for example.  It also would make quantum computing much easier to make possible.

Anyhow, making one molecule out of light is a long way off from forceshields and lightsabers, but what it does mean is that what was once considered completely impossible and fanciful now isn't, and that's pretty exciting.