This Exotic State of Light Acts Like a ‘Liquid’

Recently, researchers found that under the right conditions, light can behave like a liquid that flows in unison. That’s right — liquid light. » Subscribe to Seeker! » Watch more Elements! » Visit our shop at » Sign Up for Seeker’s Newsletter! Light has been a favorite subject of study since pretty much forever and it still has more amazing hidden properties waiting to be discovered. Recently researchers found that under the right conditions, light can behave like a liquid with particles that flow in unison. That’s right—liquid light. Well, that’s not quite right. “Liquid” is a useful analogy…but it implies the light is in a liquid state, when really it’s in a more exotic state of matter, namely a Bose-Einstein condensate, or BEC. Sometimes called the 5th state of matter, after solids, liquids, gasses, and plasma, a BEC is created when a group of par