What If Your Phone Can Get Unlimited Battery Life?

Imagine you’re on a weeklong road trip, and your phone battery is draining faster than you can find the next charging station. Every gadget you own, from your watch to your laptop, eventually needs a recharge—nothing seems truly perpetual.

Now picture a bizarre scenario where something keeps “ticking” forever, never running out of juice. It sounds impossible, right? Yet deep in the realm of cutting-edge physics, scientists have stumbled upon “time crystals”: strange systems that appear to oscillate endlessly without burning through energy.

It’s a revelation that challenges our understanding of why your phone battery dies so quickly—and how certain quantum marvels might keep going without ever needing a power outlet.

Time crystals are a newly discovered phase of matter that cycles between states periodically in time without expending energy – imagine a clock that ticks forever without any batteries​.

In physics terms, they break “time-translation symmetry”: a normal object in a stable state doesn’t change over time, but a time crystal is both stable and constantly oscillating. This strange behavior was long thought impossible (it sounds like a kind of quantum perpetual motion), yet experiments have shown time crystals can exist by cleverly avoiding the usual rules of thermodynamics​

In simpler words, a time crystal is like Jell-O that keeps jiggling on its own or a pendulum that swings forever once set into motion – a concept that has captivated scientists and is now moving from theory to reality.

Theoretical Origins – Wilczek’s Bold Idea

The story of time crystals begins in 2012 when Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek asked a provocative question. If we have ordinary crystals that repeat in space (like the grid of atoms in a diamond), could there be a crystal that repeats in time?​

Wilczek envisioned a ring of quantum particles whose lowest-energy state (its “ground state”) would involve the particles endlessly cycling through a sequence of configurations, returning to the start periodically​.

This would be a crystal in time – an object that spontaneously dances to its own rhythm without any external push.​

As Wilczek noted, this idea sounded “perilously close” to a perpetual motion machine​ which raised skepticism. Indeed, within a few years, other physicists proved that Wilczek’s original equilibrium time crystal can’t exist – a system can’t oscillate in its true ground state without energy input​.

Yet, rather than killing the idea, this result inspired new thinking. Physicists found a loophole: Wilczek’s time crystal might be impossible in a static, equilibrium situation, but if a system is driven periodically (like shining a laser on it in pulses), a “discrete time crystal” could emerge​.

In 2016, two theoretical teams (one led by Vedika Khemani and collaborators, another by Chetan Nayak at Microsoft’s Station Q) showed that a periodically driven many-particle system could spontaneously oscillate with a time period different from that of the driving force​.

This was the birth of the modern time crystal concept. Not a perpetual motion machine violating physics, but a new phase of matter that lives in the far-from-equilibrium world. It would require a delicate balance – the system must keep changing, but also somehow not absorb energy and heat up despite the driving. The key to this balance turned out to be a quantum trick called many-body localization, as we’ll see later.

Making Time Crystals Real: The 2017 Breakthroughs

For years, time crystals remained a theoretical curiosity. That changed in 2017, when scientists first created time crystals in the lab. ​

Two independent groups – one at the University of Maryland and another at Harvard University – followed a “blueprint” proposed by physicist Norman Yao.​

Each used a different experimental platform, but the essence was the same: periodically kick a quantum system of interacting particles and look for a sub-harmonic rhythm (a slower beat) that emerges on its own.

• Maryland experiment (Chris Monroe’s group): They took a line of 10 trapped ytterbium ions (charged atoms) and used lasers to alternately flip the ions’ spins and couple them together​. This is like nudging a row of spinning tops at regular intervals. Remarkably, the ions settled into a pattern where they flipped back and forth in a stable, repeating cadence – but at a frequency that was half that of the laser driving them​.
• It’s as if the jiggling Jell-O started responding on every other tap, establishing its own slower rhythm. This rigid pattern of flips is a hallmark of a time crystal.
• Harvard experiment (Mikhail Lukin’s group): Instead of ions, this team used defects in diamond (nitrogen-vacancy centers) as the spins, and achieved a similar time-crystal behavior using a different pulse scheme.
• Despite the very different hardware, the outcome was comparable – a self-organizing tick-tock that was locked to a multiple of the driving period.

Diagram of a trapped-ion time crystal: Each ion’s spin (arrow) flips in a fixed pattern, here shown as an oscillating glow, at a period different from the driving laser’s period. This was one of the first time crystals realized, using a chain of ytterbium ions​.

These first observations were big news. They proved that time crystals are real – a new state of matter that is “intrinsically out of equilibrium, unable to settle down” like ordinary matter​

“This is a new phase of matter, period. one of the first examples of non-equilibrium matter.”

As physicist Norman Yao put it.

In other words, physics now has an experimental handle on systems that never reach thermal equilibrium yet show stable order. The 2017 time crystals showed that breaking time’s symmetry is possible under the right conditions, opening the floodgates for further research. (Even Wilczek, who first dreamed of time crystals, was vindicated in spirit – the experiments achieved the kind of periodic motion he imagined, albeit in a driven system rather than a ground state.)

Stability Through Disorder: The Role of Many-Body Localization

How can these time crystals keep oscillating without heating up, even though we are constantly “kicking” the system? The secret is a phenomenon called many-body localization (MBL). In an ordinary material, if you keep injecting energy (say by repeated laser pulses), the system will absorb that energy and eventually heat to a random, disordered state (destroying any neat oscillation).

MBL prevents this by essentially trapping energy in place. In an MBL state, the particles in the system are so disordered and interact in such a way that they never reach thermal equilibrium – they can’t effectively share energy with each other, so they don’t collectively heat up​.

In the context of a time crystal, MBL is what keeps the oscillations going indefinitely. The system’s disorder (for example, slightly different interaction strengths or random positions of spins) creates “localized” modes that don’t spread energy around. ​

Thus, when you periodically drive the system, it falls into a steady drumbeat instead of a chaotic roar. As one article explained, because the system is many-body localized, “its spins or other parts are unable to settle into equilibrium; they’re stuck where they are. But the system doesn’t heat up either… Instead, it cycles back and forth indefinitely between localized states.”​

In simpler terms, MBL acts like an insulation against thermalization, letting the time crystal oscillate without damping.

This role of MBL has practical implications. It means that to build a robust time crystal, one often needs a bit of randomness or complexity in the system. Many early-time crystals were demonstrated in systems with built-in disorder (the dangling bonds in diamond, or intentionally randomized spin interactions).

If a system is too clean and perfectly periodic, it might just absorb energy and melt the time crystal behavior into ordinary heating. Researchers are also exploring alternative routes like “prethermal” time crystals, which can last a long time without full MBL, or systems in open environments that use dissipation cleverly to stabilize oscillations.

However, generally, MBL has been a key ingredient for long-lived time crystals. For any future technology using time crystals, engineers may need to embrace a bit of disorder or find ways to mimic MBL’s stabilizing effect. The upside is a huge gain in stability – in principle, an MBL-stabilized time crystal can oscillate forever without faltering​ which is exactly what makes it so attractive for applications.

Evolving Research: Recent Advances and Longer-Lived Time Crystals

Since 2017, experiments have rapidly advanced the frontier of time crystals. Scientists have been pushing to make time crystals more robust, longer-lived, and realized in different systems. Here are some highlights from 2017 to the present:

• Larger and “Quantum Computer” Time Crystals (2019–2022): In 2019, Google’s quantum computing team achieved a milestone by using a quantum processor (Sycamore) to simulate a time crystal.
• This was described in 2021 as “the world’s first time crystal built inside a quantum computer” – essentially using 20 superconducting qubits to emulate a time crystal phase​.
• Not only did this demonstrate a time crystal in a totally different platform (superconducting circuits), it also showed how quantum computers can serve as tools to study exotic physics that might be hard to create otherwise.
• In 2022, researchers at the University of Melbourne went further and constructed a time crystal using 57 qubits on IBM’s quantum cloud, the largest time crystal to date. They confirmed the telltale oscillations and showed that quantum computers are extremely useful for exploring such complex quantum phases. All of this underlines a new synergy: quantum simulation and time crystal research are advancing hand-in-hand.
• Continuous and Room-Temperature Time Crystals: Initially, all time crystals observed were of the “discrete” kind – they needed an external periodic kick. But a recent breakthrough achieved a continuous time crystal (one that oscillates in time without an external periodic driver).
• In 2024, a team at Tsinghua University in China, with collaborators in Austria and Denmark, created a “spectacular” time crystal using large Rydberg atoms (atoms excited to very high energy states) in a gas. They shone a steady laser (constant in time) through the atomic gas – no pulsing – and observed the light emerging from the gas start to oscillate on its own, as if the system spontaneously picked a clock cycle​.
• This was effectively a continuous time crystal and, notably, it was formed at room temperature in a tabletop setup. Such a result was significant because earlier time crystals typically required ultra-cold, well-controlled conditions. A room-temperature time crystal that’s more stable and longer-lived than those in deep cryogenic setups could be a game-changer​.
• Record-Setting Stability (40-minute Time Crystal): Another stunning leap came when physicists in Germany (TU Dortmund) developed a time crystal that lasted for at least 40 minutes before decaying – roughly ten million times longer than previous examples that lived only milliseconds!​.
• They achieved this in a solid-state system: a semiconductor (indium gallium arsenide) where electron spins in quantum dots interacted with nuclear spins, creating a self-sustained oscillation (in fact, a continuous time crystal)​.
• This extended lifetime suggests that time crystals can be made extremely stable under the right conditions. Forty minutes may not sound long in everyday terms, but in the quantum world of fragile coherences it’s an eternity.
• Such robustness opens the door to investigating time crystals without rushed time constraints, and hints that practical devices leveraging time crystals might be feasible once the phenomenon is better understood and controlled.

Each of these advances not only validates the existence of time crystals in new incarnations. It also builds confidence that we can engineer and control this phase of matter.

What started as a wild theory is rapidly becoming a versatile reality: time crystals in ion traps, time crystals in diamond, in superconducting qubits, in room-temperature gases, and in solid semiconductors. The progression is much like the early days of lasers or superconductors – initial demos were delicate. However, improvements came quickly as the physics became clearer.

We’re now seeing time crystals that are easier to create, last longer, and involve more particles, which is a crucial step toward harnessing them in technology.

Potential Applications and Technologies on the Horizon

One natural question is: What can we do with a time crystal? Being such a new phenomenon, time crystals don’t yet have “off-the-shelf” uses, but scientists are actively speculating and experimenting with ways to harness their unique properties. Here we’ll explore how time crystals might impact three areas – quantum computing, cryptography/communication, and energy & sensing – all while keeping the explanations accessible.

Quantum Computing and Quantum Memory

Perhaps the most immediate excitement around time crystals is in quantum computing. Quantum computers are notoriously delicate – their quantum states (“qubits”) easily lose coherence due to environmental noise or imperfections, leading to errors.

A time crystal offers a form of built-in stability: its oscillations are rigid and self-sustaining, which could be used to protect quantum information. In fact, researchers have already taken steps in this direction. In 2024, a team of U.S. and Chinese scientists turned a quantum processor itself into a kind of time crystal, creating what’s called a topological time crystal within a quantum computer​.

The result was a quantum bit oscillation that was more robust against errors. In plain terms, they embedded a time crystal’s stability into qubits and showed it could increase the qubits’ resilience to decoherence.​

This is a long way from commercial technology. However, it’s a promising proof of concept that time crystals might act as error-resistant qubit registers or clocks inside quantum machines.

Another potential use is as a quantum memory. Because a time crystal’s state is repetitive but stable, it could store information in a way that is inherently protected by the system’s structure. One could imagine encoding a bit of quantum information in the phase of the oscillation (e.g. whether the crystal’s cycle is in sync with a reference or offset by half a period).

Since the time crystal won’t easily drift out of that phase (thanks to its rigidity), the information could be preserved longer than in a normal qubit. Indeed, some experts have suggested time crystals could serve as ultra-stable memory elements for quantum computers, keeping data coherent while computations occur.​

Google’s experimental time crystal on the Sycamore processor was lauded as “one of the first times a quantum computer has found gainful employment” outside of pure computation​.

This effectively uses the quantum computer to simulate and study a time crystal which in turn teaches us how to possibly use such phases in quantum computers.

Looking forward, if we manage to integrate time-crystalline phases into quantum devices, we could see quantum CPUs with built-in oscillators that never decay, or qubits that leverage time-crystal dynamics to automatically correct certain errors.

Such improvements would bring us closer to practical, large-scale quantum computing. It’s a vivid example of how understanding a novel state of matter can translate into engineering advances. As one science article quipped, this kind of research shows quantum computers can do more than just calculate – they can create new phenomena that might make themselves better​.

Cryptography and Secure Communication

Time crystals may also influence the field of cryptography and quantum communication, albeit in more indirect ways. Today’s quantum cryptography (like quantum key distribution) relies on maintaining quantum states over distance and time to securely transmit information.

The challenge is ensuring these states aren’t disturbed by the environment. The improved stability of qubits afforded by time crystal techniques could make quantum communication channels more reliable. For example, if a qubit used for encoding a secret key can oscillate between two states in a time-crystal-like manner, it might resist decoherence long enough to be transmitted or processed, thus preserving the security of the encryption.

Moreover, if quantum computers become more powerful and stable (potentially through time crystal-based hardware improvements), they pose a double-edged sword for cryptography. On one hand, such machines could break current encryption algorithms (the general quantum computing threat).

However, on the other, they could enable new cryptographic protocols that are impossible with classical systems. Some experts have mused about “quantum clock” signals for secure communication, where two distant parties share a time-crystal-based reference signal that’s extremely stable.

Any eavesdropper trying to intercept would disturb the delicate phase relationship, revealing their presence. While this is speculative, it’s grounded in the idea that time crystals provide highly predictable, periodic quantum states that could be useful in encoding information.

Additionally, the concept of a “quantum network” could benefit from time crystals as repeaters or memory nodes. A time crystal memory could hold quantum states until a receiving node is ready, without constant energy input, minimizing noise.

This could aid in long-distance quantum key distribution by synchronizing the exchange over extended periods. It’s worth noting that these applications are still on the drawing board – unlike quantum computing, there hasn’t yet been a direct experiment showing “time crystal cryptography.”

Nonetheless, the consensus is that any technology that improves quantum state stability (which time crystals certainly do) will have ripple effects in quantum communication and encryption. At the very least, time crystals might find use in ultra-precise timekeeping for networks, providing better timing calibration for cryptographic protocols than even atomic clocks can (since time crystals can, in theory, tick with no energy loss)​

In summary, while you won’t find a time crystal in your secure smartphone just yet, the ongoing research into harnessing their stability is very relevant for the future of quantum-secure communications.

Energy, Sensing, and Beyond

Beyond computing and info-tech, time crystals hint at applications in energy storage and sensing. One intriguing idea is the concept of a quantum battery. This doesn’t mean a battery that powers a quantum computer, but rather a way to store energy in a quantum system.

Researchers have proposed that time crystals could be used to build quantum batteries that charge and discharge in new ways. Because a time crystal’s motion doesn’t degrade over time, it could potentially hold onto energy (for example, in the form of coherent oscillations) without losses, similar to how a superconducting loop stores current with no resistance.

A team at Coventry University studying time-crystal thermodynamics suggested that coupled time crystals might act as a battery – one time crystal could transfer energy to another and sustain oscillations that effectively store energy in a locked rhythm.​

The advantage would be high efficiency and longevity: in principle, a time crystal battery wouldn’t “leak” energy as heat. This is very early-stage research, but it shows the imagination: time crystals could one day contribute to energy storage technology if these theoretical ideas pan out​.

In the realm of sensing, time crystals could shine as well. The oscillating spins or atoms in a time crystal are extremely sensitive to disturbances – if something tries to perturb the timing, it’s noticeable since the pattern is so regular. This could be exploited to build highly sensitive sensors, for example, for magnetic fields.

A time crystal made of spins (like that diamond defect system) might change its oscillation phase or frequency slightly in the presence of a magnetic field, thus acting as a precise magnetometer. Some researchers have indeed speculated about using time crystals as precision measurement tools; one paper noted they “could be used to make highly sensitive magnetic-field detectors”​

Because the time crystal’s baseline behavior is “no change without a cause,” any deviation signals the presence of an external influence. It’s analogous to a violin string that’s always humming – if a tiny force hits it, you hear a change in the tune immediately.

Time crystals might also improve timekeeping itself. While it sounds circular (a time crystal keeping time), the fact that these systems oscillate at a fixed frequency could make them good clock references. Today’s best clocks are atomic clocks, which use the natural oscillations of atoms.

A time crystal might provide an even more robust reference if we learn how to couple it into a device, because it can’t easily be perturbed out of its rhythm. Frank Wilczek originally mused that time crystals might lead to clocks beyond existing technology​

Imagine a clock that, once started, never needs winding and never skips a beat because its ticking is protected by a phase of matter! This is still speculative, but not off the table as the field evolves.

To sum up, the potential applications of time crystals range from quantum computers that don’t crash, to communications that remain secure, to batteries that never drain (at least at the quantum scale), to sensors that detect the faintest signals, and even to clocks of unprecedented accuracy. We should emphasize that each of these is an active research topic, not a done deal. As one physicist joked, in 2017 he was “hard put to imagine a use for a time crystal”​

Yet just a few years later, multiple uses are coming into focus. The ongoing challenge is taking the fragile, small-scale demonstrations of time crystals and scaling them up or integrating them into devices.

That will likely keep scientists and engineers busy for the foreseeable future, but the motivation is clear: if successful, the payoff could be revolutionary in several high-tech arenas.

Global Research Efforts: A New Quantum Race

Time crystal research has quickly become a global endeavor, and there’s a healthy dose of competition alongside collaboration. Major scientific powers – the United States, China, and the European Union, as well as others like the UK – are all investing in quantum research programs that include exotic phases of matter like time crystals.

It’s helpful to see this in the context of the broader “quantum technology race.” Quantum computing, quantum communication, and quantum materials are seen as strategic fields that could define the future of technology (and confer economic and security advantages).

Time crystals sit at the intersection of these topics, so it’s no surprise that leading nations are keen to support research in this area.

China in particular has made headlines with some record-setting achievements. In mid-2024, Chinese scientists at Tsinghua University (with international partners) created the first room-temperature time crystal, as noted earlier​.

This was a significant leap that “triggered a new round of activities in the US, UK, and European Union” to accelerate their own quantum research​

China has explicitly marked quantum science as a strategic priority, pouring substantial funding into it. According to an analysis, China is “already the world’s largest investor in quantum technology, way ahead of the UK, US, Germany, South Korea, and Russia.”​

The room-temperature time crystal demonstration is seen as proof of China’s commitment to lead – and it spurred other countries to take the challenge seriously. Within weeks of that result, we saw heightened discussions in Western labs about pushing their time crystal experiments further.

The United States has been a front-runner in time crystal research from the start (the concept was born here, and the first experiments were American-led), but the US approach is a mix of academic, government, and private sector efforts.

On the government side, agencies like the National Science Foundation (NSF) and Department of Energy fund fundamental research in condensed matter and quantum physics that includes time crystal work.

The US also benefits from a vibrant university system – for example, Princeton and Berkeley theorists were pivotal in formulating how to make time crystals, and teams at Harvard, Maryland, Stanford and others have led experiments. On the industrial side, companies like Google and IBM have made significant contributions (Google’s quantum processor time crystal, IBM providing cloud quantum hardware for researchers)​

In fact, an advantage the US has is precisely this strong private-sector R&D: Google, IBM, Microsoft, and others are investing heavily in quantum technologies and often partnering with academic groups. The synergy can speed up research – as seen when Google’s team collaborated with Stanford physicists to realize a time crystal on a chip.

While China’s approach is often top-down and state-driven, the US tends to leverage these industry-academia partnerships. After China’s room-temperature success, American and European scientists have certainly felt the pressure to keep up, underscoring that this is not just pure science, but a bit of a race.

In Europe, the European Union has a flagship Quantum Technologies program, and many European researchers are deeply involved in time crystal studies. For instance, the team that worked with Tsinghua included scientists from Denmark and Austria, highlighting Europe’s collaborative spirit​

pamirllc.com. Groups in the UK (like at Cambridge and Oxford) and in Germany (like TU Dortmund’s 40-minute crystal team) are among those leading the way. Europe may not have tech giants like Google driving this specific research, but it does have strong public funding and international projects. We are seeing Europe step up efforts, partly motivated by not wanting to be outpaced.

“Increasingly aware of the need to step up innovation in the field, particularly after the Chinese breakthrough.”

​As the Pamir Consulting report on the quantum race noted, the US, UK, and EU are

All told, time crystal research is a microcosm of the global quantum technology competition. It involves cooperation (scientists publish openly and often work across borders) but also an underlying strategic competition for leadership. There is a sense that whoever masters technologies like time crystals could gain an edge in next-generation computing or sensing devices.

This dynamic is reminiscent of past scientific races (like the space race or the race for the atomic clock), albeit on a smaller scale so far. The good news for science is that competition can fuel progress: multiple groups around the world are pushing one another to achieve better results, be it longer-lived crystals, new platforms, or practical demos.

Private Sector and Tech Giants: Who’s Involved?

The private sector’s involvement in time crystal research is notable and growing. Big tech companies with interests in quantum computing have naturally gravitated towards this cutting-edge topic, seeing it both as a scientific curiosity and a potential enabler for their technologies. Here’s a quick rundown of key players and what they’re doing:

• Google: Google’s Quantum AI division has been at the forefront, using their Sycamore superconducting quantum processor to both simulate and experimentally realize time crystal behavior​quantamagazine.org​quantamagazine.org. In 2021, Google, in collaboration with Stanford researchers, announced the creation of a time crystal on 20 qubits of Sycamore, which was widely reported as a landmark achievement (even Fortune magazine and others in the tech press picked up the story, bringing the term “time crystal” into mainstream news).
• Google’s work demonstrated how a quantum computer itself can become a laboratory for new physics. It’s also worth noting that Google’s team included theorists like Khemani (Stanford) and Moessner (Max Planck Institute), showing a close academia-industry partnership. Google benefits because understanding time crystals could lead to more stable quantum operations, and the scientific community benefits from Google’s cutting-edge hardware.
• IBM: IBM has made its quantum computers available via the cloud (IBM Quantum Experience), and researchers have used them to explore time crystals. As mentioned, a 57-qubit time crystal was implemented on an IBM Quantum processor by external scientists​physicsworld.com​physicsworld.com. IBM itself is interested in any algorithms or error mitigation techniques that might come from this research.
• While IBM hasn’t made splashy “time crystal created” headlines with an in-house team, they have a strong presence in quantum computing R&D and even published educational materials (like a Qiskit tutorial) on simulating time crystals​medium.com. IBM’s strategy often emphasizes enabling the scientific community with tools, and time crystals are on the radar in terms of using IBM machines to test quantum many-body physics. In short, IBM is indirectly but importantly involved by providing the infrastructure on which time-crystal experiments can run.
• Microsoft: Microsoft’s quantum program (including Station Q, its research lab) has a more theoretical bent, focusing on things like topological quantum computing. Interestingly, one of the early theoretical proposals for discrete time crystals was co-authored by Chetan Nayak, a physicist who leads Microsoft’s Station Q, along with academic collaborators​. Microsoft’s approach to quantum hardware is different (they’ve been pursuing topological qubits), but the concept of a “topological time crystal” has now emerged, blending Wilczek’s idea with topology​.
• Microsoft researchers are certainly exploring these ideas, as evidenced by their participation in early papers. As Microsoft works on making stable qubits (e.g., Majorana-based qubits), any technique like time crystals that could help protect quantum states is of interest. So, while Microsoft might not have a commercial time crystal product, they are contributing to the theoretical understanding and seeding the field – and could be a key player if time crystals become part of quantum computing architectures.
• Startups and Others: Beyond the giants, several startups and smaller companies are touching on time crystal research indirectly. For example, IonQ, a prominent quantum computing startup, was co-founded by Chris Monroe, the scientist who led one of the first time crystal experiments with trapped ions. IonQ’s focus is building ion-trap quantum computers, and while they don’t claim to be making time crystals for customers, Monroe’s expertise certainly carries over – the same ion chains that function as qubits in IonQ’s devices could, in theory, be used to generate time crystal dynamics. One could imagine IonQ or similar companies leveraging that phenomenon to improve coherence in their systems.
• Another startup example is any company working on quantum sensors or clocks; they might explore time crystals as part of their R&D to achieve better stability. While specific names are hard to pin (quantum startups tend to keep proprietary details under wraps), the broader startup ecosystem in quantum tech is aware of time crystals through the scientific literature and conferences. We can say that forward-looking startups are “time crystal curious” – they are keeping an eye on developments to see if there’s a practical advantage they can harness.

In summary, the private sector’s involvement ranges from direct experimentation (Google) to providing platforms (IBM) to theoretical work (Microsoft) to potential adopters (various startups). This involvement is crucial, because turning time crystals from a lab novelty into technology will likely require engineering prowess and resources that industry can provide.

It’s reminiscent of how private companies got involved in early laser development or semiconductor research after initial discoveries – they add momentum and often bring interdisciplinary expertise. We are still in a fundamental research stage with time crystals. However, the presence of tech giants in the field is a strong signal that there are expected long-term payoffs, whether in computing power or sensing capability. It’s also a sign that the science is solidifying – companies are usually pragmatic; they wouldn’t invest if they thought time crystals were just a wild goose chase.

Ethical and Strategic Implications

With great scientific breakthroughs come important ethical and strategic considerations, and time crystals are no exception. While it might sound odd to talk about ethics in the context of a physics discovery, here we’re really talking about the broader impact on society, geopolitics, and how science is conducted. Several points are worth noting:

• Geopolitical Impact and the “Quantum Arms Race”: As we’ve discussed, countries are racing to lead in quantum technologies, and time crystals have become one of the sought-after jewels in that race. If one nation manages to harness time crystals for, say, vastly improving quantum computers, it could gain a significant strategic advantage – for example, it might build quantum computers capable of breaking most encryption, or detect submarines with quantum sensors, etc. This raises geopolitical stakes. Governments are certainly aware of this: China’s big investments and the US/EU responses show that there is a quasi arms-race dynamic. The ethical question is how to balance open scientific collaboration with national security.
• During the Cold War, we saw fields like space exploration toggling between open science and military secrecy. Quantum research, including time crystals, may walk that line in coming years. There is a risk that if time crystals became crucial for defense or economic dominance, research could become classified or less openly shared. That could slow scientific progress. Conversely, a spirit of collaboration (like that seen in the international co-authorship of many time crystal papers) could ensure that all of humanity benefits. The UN declaring 2025 the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology underscores the desire for a global push in quantum, hopefully encouraging collaboration over competition​.
• Technology Monopolization: Another consideration is whether breakthroughs like time crystals will be accessible or monopolized by a few corporations or countries. For instance, if a tech giant patents a method to use time crystals in quantum memory, will that concentrate power in that company’s hands? There’s an ongoing debate about quantum patents and how much fundamental physics should remain in the public domain. Ethically, many argue that since time crystals were discovered through academic inquiry, the basic knowledge should remain open, and only specific applications might be patentable. So far, much of the research has been published in journals for all to see. But as the private sector involvement grows, one can expect some proprietary techniques to emerge. This situation will need careful navigation to avoid stifling innovation – we don’t want only one company or nation holding all the “time crystal cards.” The ideal scenario is a competitive but fair environment where multiple entities can develop applications, driving innovation and lowering costs, much like what happened with semiconductor development.
• Security and Ethics of Applications: If time crystals help create ultra-powerful quantum computers, we face the known ethical dilemmas of quantum computing: the potential to break current cryptographic codes. Governments and institutions will need to preemptively strengthen encryption (there’s already work on post-quantum cryptography for this reason). On the flip side, if time crystals enable new secure communication methods, there could be ethical issues in terms of privacy (who gets access to unbreakable communication? just governments or everyone?). And if quantum sensors become super sensitive, there are military implications (detecting stealth aircraft or subs, etc.), which might destabilize current balances. These are broad strategic issues wherein time crystals play a part as an enabling piece of technology.
• Scientific Collaboration vs. Competition: Ethically, scientists typically value sharing knowledge. The time crystal community has so far been very collaborative internationally. The Tsinghua room-temperature experiment had Chinese and European co-authors, the Google time crystal had academics from multiple institutions. But as the media and governments frame these as “races,” scientists might feel pressure to be less open. There’s a careful line to walk: competition can spur rapid progress, but overly secretive competition can slow down the overall advancement (since people duplicate efforts or hide results). The hope is that, as has largely been the case, researchers will continue to publish and discuss openly, even as they compete for firsts. Ethically, one might argue there’s a duty for researchers in this fundamental field to keep it open, because the potential benefits (e.g. better computers, better clocks) serve all of humanity. An encouraging sign is that even breakthrough results (like the 40-minute time crystal in Germany or the Tsinghua experiment) were quickly shared in papers and press releases, not kept under wraps.

In a way, time crystals illustrate how pure science can unexpectedly intersect with societal concerns. What began as a whimsical question – “Can we have a clock that runs forever?” – now touches on issues of international competition and high-tech dominance. It’s a reminder that advances in physics can have far-reaching consequences. Policymakers and the scientific community will need to ensure that as we develop time crystal technology, it’s done responsibly and inclusively. This might involve international agreements (similar to how GPS and timing standards are cooperatively managed, one could envision agreements on quantum standards), funding open research, and guarding against misuse.

Ultimately, the emergence of time crystals has been a triumph of human curiosity and collaboration. Frank Wilczek’s wild idea has blossomed into a field engaging scientists around the world. The way this story continues – whether it becomes a tale of open science benefiting everyone, or a cloak-and-dagger race for advantage – will depend on the choices made by researchers, institutions, and governments in the coming years. The hope among many in the community is that time crystals, like ordinary crystals, will be a shared resource – something we can all study, marvel at, and build upon, in the spirit of scientific progress.