That sounds so totally metal, doesn’t it? Technology Review explains how to make a sound so heavy, no light can escape:
One of the many curious properties of Bose-Einstein Condensates (BECs) is that the flow of sound through them is governed by the same equations that describe how light is bent by a gravitational field. That sets up the possibility of all kinds of fun and games: in theory, physicists can reproduce with sound and BECs whatever wicked way gravity has with light.
Today, Ori Lahav and his mates at the Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa, say that they’ve created the sonic equivalent of a black hole in a BEC.
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Any sound waves (or phonons) created inside the event horizon can never escape because the flow there is supersonic. That’s the black hole.
Lahav and co set up a supersonic flow by creating a deep potential well in the middle of a BEC that attracts atoms.
They’re hoping to observe Hawking radiation (or the sonic equivalent), which will help settle one of science’s most famous bets.