Creating light from vacuum

Scientists at Chalmers University of Technology succeeded in creating light from vacuum.

However, the vacuum is far from empty space and is actually filled with various particles fluctuating in and out of existence, so called 'Virtual Particles'.

                                 Image: virtual photons bouncing of the "mirror" in pairs
The experiment was conducted by letting two virtual photons bounce of a SQUID "mirror" that vibrates at close to the speed of light. The "mirror" is extremely sensitive to magnetic fields and by changing the direction of the magnetic field several billions of times a second they were able to make the "mirror" vibrate at up to 25% of the speed of light.

The result was that photons appeared in pairs from the vacuum, which they were able to measure in the form of microwave radiation.

This is interesting and proves that one, at least in theory should be able to create other particles than photons, such as electrons and protons, at a much higher energy cost of course.
However, the true value of this experiment lies in it's expanding of our understanding of basic physical concepts, such as vacuum fluctuations which may have a connection with the dark energy that drives the accelerated expansion of the universe.



Please keep in mind that this is only my amateur opinion, I do have a physics degree, and understand the concept of this experiment and some of the technical details but there's much of it that I do not understand.