World-first crystal tunes laser light to power ultra-precise, compact nuclear clocks which could guide submarines and deep-space probes
2-MIN READ2-MIN ListenLing Xinin OhioPublished: 10:00pm, 11 Apr 2026Scientists in Xinjiang have created the world’s first crystal that can produce the ultraviolet light needed for future thorium nuclear clocks, which could one day guide submarines and deep-space probes without GPS.The fluorinated borate compound could push laser light to a record 145.2 nanometres (nm) – a wavelength short enough to meet a key requirement for these ultra-precise, portable clocks being developed in the United States, China and elsewhere, the team reported in Advanced Materials in January.
The result surpassed previous benchmarks set by potassium beryllium fluoroborate, a crystal developed in China in the 1990s that has long dominated the field but can only reach about 150nm – just short of the 148.3nm target needed for such clocks.
The work offers a new way to design next-generation deep-ultraviolet materials and “paves the way for the practical development of the thorium-229 nuclear clock”, the team led by Pan Shilie at the Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry wrote in the paper.
Like other advanced clocks, it uses thorium atoms, a laser to probe them and a detector to read the signal. The laser must be tuned to a very specific wavelength to “tick” the nucleus, with timing set by how regularly it responds.
