In Keeper of Light and Dust*, my villain - a brilliant if psychotic man - believes the Zero Point Field to provide the scientific explanation for chi and its link to human consciousness: a viewpoint that sets him at odds with his peers in the field of science.

The Zero Point Field itself is not a controversial concept. It is simply empty space, like the space between the stars.

It is space with the lowest possible energy reading: almost nothing - only half a photon. But there are so many of these tiny electromagnetic fields that what people think of as an empty vacuum is really one infinitely large space filled with energy.

More controversial are the ideas that the Field act as a vast psi-space and that all living beings are plugged into this space, which allows us to interact and exchange our energy, even our consciousness. There are even those who believe that the Zero Point Field explains paranormal activities such as remote viewing and remote healing.

On a more practical note, theses have been posited suggesting that should it be possible to harness the energy of the Zero Point Field, that it will be enough to power up every car on the planet: the ultimate clean energy.

When I researched the topic of 'remote viewing' for my previous book, Season of the Witch, I became interested in the concept of psi-space and read up on Hall Puthoff's work at Stanford Research Institute and his enthusiasm for the Zero Point Field. A chance reading of Lynne McTaggert's The Field, in which she offers a compelling argument for the concept of an interconnected universe, further inspired me, specifically her chapter on Fritz-Albert Popp and his research into biophotonics. It is a book I can highly recommend.