A study in the journal Nano Letters shows that the well-known rules of heat transfer from a nonreflective object, called Planck's blackbody radiation law, break down if the object can be brought close enough to another object while still not touching it.

    發表在《納米快報》（Nano Letters）雜志上的一項研究表明，眾所周知的非反射性物體的熱傳導定律（也稱為普朗克黑體輻射定律）在該物體與另外一個物體足夠靠近，但仍然不接觸時，這個定律就不成立了。

    Century-Old Physics Law Violated

    In 1900 legendary physicist Max Planck described the way energy gets dissipated from any nonreflective object, called a blackbody. But even Max said if something else is really, really close to the object, his law might not hold.

    Now physicists from M.I.T. have finally shown that if you can get another object near enough to the blackbody, but still not touching it, Planck's blackbody radiation law really does break down. Which is good news for you.

    The reseachers had been able to put flat plates a millionth of a meter apart. Which was still too far away to see any effect. But with glass beads, they achieved separations of only 10 billionths of a meter. And the radiation flow was up to a thousand times greater than Planck's law predicts. The study appears in the August issue of the journal Nano Letters.

    It's good news because of potential applications. For example, computer data storage and solar energy devices are all less efficient because of heat buildup. If tinier distances can be achieved in these real-world devices, such waste could be made to walk the plank.

    世紀物理定律不再成立

    1900年傳奇物理學家馬克斯·普朗克（Max Planck）描述了能量從任意非反射性物體（稱為黑體）消散的方式。但是即使是馬克斯也曾說到，如果另外一個物體真的和該物體非常接近的話，那么他的定律可能也不成立。

    目前來自麻省理工學院（M.I.T.）的物理學家們最終表明，如果你能讓另外一個物體與黑體足夠地靠近，但是仍然不接觸的話，普朗克黑體輻射定律就真的不成立了。這對你來說是個好消息。

    研究者們曾經使讓兩個平的薄片處于百萬分之一米的距離。但是這個距離還是太遠了，以致于不能看到任何的效果。但是，研究者們使用玻璃小珠子，讓它們分離的距離在100億分之一米。這時候輻射流比普朗克定律預測到的要大近1000倍。這項研究發表在8月份的《納米快報》（Nano Letters）雜志上。

    這是個好消息，因為這個研究具有潛在的應用前景。比如，計算機數據存儲以及太陽能器件因為熱累積的原因其效率都不高。如果在這些真實器件中讓元件之間的距離再減少些，那么這些熱損耗可能就能得到利用了。

    Vocabulary:

    Nonreflective:非反射的

    Blackbody:黑體

    Legendary:傳奇的

    Dissipate:消散；浪費

    Radiation:輻射

    Potential:潛在的

    Storage:存儲

    Solar:太陽能

    Buildup:逐步增加

    Plank:木板