Airy theory, but true

For decades, physicists have known that quantum theory allows for wavelike objects to follow curved trajectories known as Airy functions, after the 19th-century British astronomer George Biddell Airy. Scientists have now managed to bend a beam of light into just such a shape.

TURNING POINT. A computer simulation shows that a laser beam tweaked by going through a liquid-crystal panel will take a curved trajectory.