From new states of matter to a unification of light and electrons

For a long time, people believe that all possible states of matter are described by Landau symmetry-breaking theory. Recently we found that string-net condensation provide a mechanism to produce states of matter beyond the symmetry-breaking description. The collective excitations of the string-net condensed states turn out to be our old friends, photons and electrons (and other gauge bosons and fermions). This suggests that our vacuum is a string-net condensed state. Light and electrons in our vacuum have a unified origin - string-net condensation. (author)