The Princeton MRSEC has detected a unique quantum property of an elusive particle, the Majorana fermion that is notable for behaving simultaneously like matter and antimatter. Using enhanced scanning tunneling microscopy techniques, the team captured signals from the Majorana particle at both ends of an atomically thin iron wire stretched on the surface of a crystal of lead. Their research detected a distinctive quantum property known as spin, which has been proposed for transmitting quantum information in circuits that contain the Majorana particle.
