Scientists have created a blazing-fast scientific camera that shoots images at an encoding rate of 156.3 terahertz (THz) to individual pixels — equivalent to 156.3 trillion frames per second.
Scientists have created a blazing-fast scientific camera that shoots images at an encoding rate of 156.3 terahertz (THz) to individual pixels — equivalent to 156.3 trillion frames per second. Dubbed SCARF (swept-coded aperture real-time femtophotography), the research-grade camera could lead to breakthroughs in fields studying micro-events that come and go too quickly for today’s most expensive scientific sensors.
SCARF has successfully captured ultrafast events like absorption in a semiconductor and the demagnetization of a metal alloy. The research could open new frontiers in areas as diverse as shock wave mechanics or developing more effective medicine.
And if you were to watch it at 60Hz you would need 82+ years to watch that one second. Hope you know exactly where you’re wanting to look or can scrub it really fast!
I was doing some napkin math for how many femtoseconds there are between each frame and how that compares to Planck time but this response does a better job capturing how cool this is.
After seeing the one where they slam Dan's face with a ball and you see his skull moving under his skin I realized there can be entire fields of study around insanely fast cameras. What we see in real time doesn't even compare. Also the one where Gav shows how CRTs work is still my favorite.