The orbiton was predicted theoretically by van den Brink, Khomskii and Sawatzky in 1997–1998. Its experimental observation as a separate quasiparticle was reported in paper sent to publishers in September 2011. The research states that by firing a beam of X-ray photons at a single electron in a one-dimensional sample of strontium cuprate, this will excite the electron to a higher orbital, causing the beam to lose a fraction of its energy in the process. In doing so, the electron will be separated into a spinon and an orbiton. This can be traced by observing the energy and momentum of the X-rays before and after the collision.