Certain quantum systems may be able to defy entropy’s effects forever

The fundamental laws of physics insist that no patterns can permanently survive nature’s steady course towards disorder – or can they? A new proof offers a peculiar counterexample to the once-settled notion that all collections of particles must eventually succumb to entropy.

“Our result might seem quite surprising,” says Andrew Lucas at the University of Colorado Boulder. But his team’s finding is actually the most recent entry in a decades-long debate over whether quantum particles can maintain certain properties forever.