help - subluminal light propagation

I'm also interested in this as well. I'm specifically curious about the mass and energy at this low speed.

Okay,

In Australia yesterday the Financial Review posted an article on developments in this field, lead by a Professor Ben Eggleton at Sydney University and a program called CUDOS.

Apparently this professor has a way of slowing light right down in a way that doesn't degrade the signal in the slighest - a major breakthrough.

http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/cudos/news/index.html

or

http://www.ferret.com.au/articles/b7/0c02e0b7.asp

Google "Slow light CUDOS and Sydney University Physics" for lotsa links

I think you'll find the underlying method is althought light or electricity carriers move at lightspeed , a signal has a wave front that moves at a slightly slower rate due to collisions, absorption and re-emition of a carrier. For electricity in a non super conductor the signal front can move at 1/10th of lightspeed, even though each individual electron is moving at much higher rates. I guess researchers are trying to produce all digital, optical carriers that can slow light down where they have to (read lotsa collisions) to get a really good signal to noise ratio.

that was a valuable link.thanx g_day