The New Age Wonder - Super Fluidity

The wonders of the universe are as many as the mind can imagine and yet cannot comprehend in all totality. One such wonder is that of super fluidity. This term reverts to a fantabulous phase relating to the realm of matter. It is commonly used to refer to the description of the capacity or role of heat that actually gives rise to or allows the development of unusual effects when and as liquid forms of either helium 3 or helium 4 are subjected to friction of designed sort.

Typically when the developments around liquids matter such as in the states of helium 3 and 4 overcome an action of friction that has been induced due to some sort of surface interaction, the action reaches a certain point that is commonly and scientifically referred to as lambda point, especially in the case of a reaction seen or observed in helium 4. It is interesting to note that Helium 3 has one neutron and two protons and is non radioactive, light isotope of helium. Helium is the nucleus of the helium 3 atom. Ordinary helium consists of two neutrons.

It was in the year 1934 that Mark Oliphant, a nuclear scientist from Australia, in his study at the Cavendish Laboratory at the Cambridge University, first proposed its existence. While experimenting, it was found that fast deuterons were reacted with other deuteron targets. This was then, the first experiment of its kind on nuclear fusion. At this point and in accordance with the laws relating to super fluidity, the viscosity of the liquid comes to the point of ‘zero'.

This development is now being researched upon and being studied as a major part of research on what is referred to as quantum hydrodynamics. The discovery was first made by scientists Don Misener, Pyotr Kapitsa and John Allen. The discovery of 1937 almost immediately supported and took on various descriptions to aid microscopic as well as phenomenological theories that have been making the rounds.

Throughout the 1950s, the genius of Vinen and Hall fuelled monetarily and via dedicated research experiments that were designed around establishing the known and yet not scientifically identified presence of vortex quantized lines. A decade later, in the 1960s, through the genius of Reif and Rayfield the world of science was able to correctly establish the presence of rings of quantized vortex origin.

Moving along the same dynamics and the observations so far, Packard made an important point based on extensive research - the intersection of the discovered vortex lines in regards to the fluid's free surface resulted in what came to be popularized as the Josephson Effect. Including Varoquaux and Avenel, the resultant super fluid that went by the scientific denotation of 4He soon became the talk of the fraternity and all allied industries that depended on it. It was observed that Helium II, during the experiment, kept creeping along the available and induced surfaces till such time that it finally found its own level. The experiment has added new value to the domain of physics.