Now University of Rochester researchers have succeeded in creating particles with negative mass in an atomically thin semiconductor, by causing it to interact with confined light in an optical microcavity.

Above – In this optical microcavity, created by the lab of Nick Vamivakas, confined light interacts with an atomically thin semiconductor to create particles with negative mass. The device also presents "a way to generate laser light with an incrementally small amount of power," says Vamivakas, an associate professor of quantum optics and quantum physics at Rochester's Institute of Optics. (Illustration by Michael Osadciw/University of Rochester)

This alone is "interesting and exciting from a physics perspective," says Nick Vamivakas, an associate professor of quantum optics and quantum physics at Rochester's Institute of Optics. "But it also turns out the device we've created presents a way to generate laser light with an incrementally small amount of power."