One of the most famous time travel movies, Back to the Future, is not least remembered for the damn stylish DeLorean. The main part, thanks to which it was possible to make time jumps, was the flux capacitor. And it would have remained just a fantasy of screenwriters Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis, if a group of scientists from Austria and Switzerland had not created a real flux capacitor, the use of which for time travel is still in question, but it is useful for something else.
The new device can control the movement of the microwave signals it contains. Moreover, scientists have developed not one, but as many as two options for constructing a flux capacitor: two-way and three-way. It is the latter that resembles the invention of Dr. Emmett Brown.
Diagram of a three-band flux capacitor.
The device uses the effect of quantum tunneling of magnetic flux around the capacitor, thereby breaking the principle of symmetry with respect to time-reversal symmetry. But since we are talking about time, you should not rejoice and think that we are close to creating a time machine. In a simplified way, this means that microwave signals simply start moving in one specific direction. According to one of the authors of the development, Tom States, “Our device will be very useful for implementing quantum computing. This will require high precision control over signal propagation. Moreover, this technology can be used in radar systems, wireless data transmission modules, to improve the signal quality and speed of mobile communications, the Internet, and so on."
Vladimir Kuznetsov