Science Thursday
Out of context: Reply #40
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FTL Photons get speeding ticket
But not everyone is convinced the pair have interpreted their results correctly.
Some argue that what the scientists have observed can be explained by the so-called Hartman Effect. This predicts that "the tunneling time becomes independent of barrier length for thick enough barriers, ultimately resulting in unbounded tunneling velocities".
What this means is that single photons can appear to travel faster than the speed of light. But researchers suggest that tunneling time should not be considered as a transit time, but rather as a "cavity lifetime".
Herbert G Winful from the University of Michigan explains in this paper that anomalously short delays in barrier tunneling "should not be linked to a velocity since evanescent waves do not propagate".
So, Einstein is off the hook, and thus restored to his rightful place as top boffin. ®