PHYSICISTS have set a limit on the smallest length that can ever be measured – and any device that tries to beat the limit will be crushed into a black hole of its own making.
The finding is based on an analysis of interferometry, a technique that uses interference of waves to measure small lengths. Quantum theory says that the more accurate the measurement you want, the more massive the interferometer you need.
But Xavier Calmet, Michael Graesser and Stephen Hsu of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena point out that any very massive interferometer would have to be spread…
