Category Archives: Quantum Physics
How physicists are probing the Higgs boson 10 years after its discovery – Science News Magazine
Javier Duarte kicked off his scientific career by witnessing the biggest particle physics event in decades. On July 4, 2012, scientists at the laboratory CERN near Geneva announced the discovery of the Higgs boson, the long-sought subatomic particle that reveals the origins of mass. Duarte was an eager graduate student whod just arrived at CERN.
I was physically there maybe a week before the announcement, Duarte says. As buzzing throngs of physicists crowded together to watch the announcement at CERN, Duarte didnt make it to the main auditorium. That space was for VIPs and those determined enough to wait in line all night to snag a seat. Instead, he says, he found himself in the basement, in an overflow room of an overflow room.
But the enthusiasm was still palpable. It was a very exciting time to be getting immersed into that world, he says. Since then, he and thousands of other physicists from around the world working on CERN experiments have gone all out exploring the particles properties.
Scientists predicted the existence of the Higgs boson back in 1964, as a hallmark of the process that gives elementary particles mass. But finding the particle had to wait for CERNs Large Hadron Collider, or LHC. In 2010, the LHC began smashing protons together at extremely high energies, while two large experiments, ATLAS and CMS, used massive detectors to look through the debris.
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The particles discovery filled in the missing keystone of the standard model of particle physics. That theory explains the known elementary particles and their interactions. Those particles and interactions are behind just about everything we know. The particles serve as building blocks of atoms and transmit crucial forces of nature, such as electromagnetism. And the mass of those particles is key to their behavior. If electrons were massless, for example, atoms wouldnt form. Without the Higgs boson, then, one of scientists most successful theories would collapse.
The Higgs boson discovery dominated headlines around the globe. About half a million people tuned in to watch the livestreamed announcement, and footage from the event appeared on more than 5,000 news programs. Even oddball minutiae made it into the press, with a few articles analyzing the physicists use of the often-scorned font Comic Sans in their presentation. Little more than a year later, the discovery garnered a Nobel Prize for two of the scientists who developed the theory behind the Higgs boson, Franois Englert and Peter Higgs for whom the particle is named.
Now, as the discovery turns 10 years old, that initial excitement persists for Duarte and many other particle physicists. As a professor at the University of California, San Diego and member of the CMS experiment, Duartes research still revolves around the all-important particle. Progress in understanding the Higgs has been stunning, he says. Weve come so much farther than we expected to.
Physicists have been working through a checklist of things they want to know about the Higgs boson. They spent the last decade cataloging its properties, including how it interacts with several other particles. Though measurements have so far been in line with the predictions made by the standard model, if a discrepancy turns up in the future, it may mean there are unknown particles yet to be discovered.
And theres still more on the agenda. An especially important item is the Higgs bosons interaction with itself. To help pin down this and other Higgs properties, scientists are looking forward to collecting more data. Scientists turned on an upgraded LHC for a new round of work in April. At the time of the Higgs discovery, collisions at the LHC reached an energy of 8 trillion electron volts. Collisions are expected to roll in at a record 13.6 trillion electron volts starting July 5, and data-taking will continue until 2026. These higher energies offer opportunities to spot heavier particles. And the High-Luminosity LHC, a more powerful iteration of the LHC, is expected to start up in 2029.
Finding a particle, it sounds like the end of something, but its really only the beginning, says experimental particle physicist Mara Cepeda of CIEMAT in Madrid, a member of the CMS collaboration.
Studying the Higgs boson is like geocaching, says theoretical particle physicist Gudrun Heinrich of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany. Much like hobbyists use a GPS device to uncover a hidden stash of fun trinkets, physicists are using their wits to uncover the treasure trove of the Higgs boson. In 2012, scientists merely located the cache; the next 10 years were devoted to revealing its contents. And that investigation continues. The hope is that the contents will contain something like a map that is guiding us towards an even bigger treasure, Heinrich says.
Detailed study of the Higgs boson could help scientists solve mysteries that the standard model fails to explain. We know that the theory has limitations, says theoretical particle physicist Laura Reina of Florida State University in Tallahassee. For instance, the standard model has no explanation for dark matter, a shadowy substance that throws its weight around the cosmos, exerting a gravitational pull necessary to explain a variety of astronomical observations. And the theory cant explain other quandaries, like why the universe is composed mostly of matter rather than its alter ego, antimatter. Many proposed solutions to the standard models shortcomings require new particles that would alter how the Higgs interacts with known particles.
The Higgs boson itself isnt responsible for mass. Instead, thats the job of the Higgs field. According to quantum physics, all particles are actually blips in invisible fields, like ripples atop a pond. Higgs bosons are swells in the Higgs field, which pervades the entire cosmos. When elementary particles interact with the Higgs field, they gain mass. The more massive the particle, the more strongly it interacts with the Higgs field, and with the Higgs boson. Massless particles, like photons, dont directly interact with the Higgs field at all.
One of the best ways to hunt for Higgs-related treasure is to measure those interactions, known as couplings. The Higgs couplings describe what particles the Higgs boson decays into, what particles can fuse to produce Higgs bosons and how often those processes occur. Scientists gauge these couplings by sifting through and analyzing the showers of particles produced when Higgs bosons pop up in the debris of proton smashups.
Even if unknown particles are too heavy to show up at the LHC, the Higgs couplings could reveal their existence. Any of these couplings not being what you expect them to be is a very clear sign of incredibly interesting new physics behind it, says particle physicist Marumi Kado of Sapienza University of Rome and CERN, who is the deputy spokesperson for the ATLAS collaboration.
Physicists have already checked the couplings to several elementary particles. These include both major classes of particles in physics: bosons (particles that carry forces) and fermions (particles that make up matter, such as electrons). Scientists have measured the Higgs interactions with a heavy relative of the electron called a tau lepton (a fermion) and with the W and Z bosons, particles that transmit the weak force, which is responsible for some types of radioactive decay. Researchers also pegged the Higgs couplings to the top quark and bottom quark. Those are two of the six types of quarks, which glom together into larger particles such as protons and neutrons. (The Higgs is responsible for the mass of elementary particles, but the mass of composite particles, including protons and neutrons, instead comes mostly from the energy of the particles jangling around within.)
The couplings measured so far involve the standard models heavier elementary particles. The top quark, for example, is about as heavy as an entire gold atom. Since the Higgs couples more strongly to heavy particles, those interactions tend to be easier to measure. Next up, scientists want to observe the lighter particles couplings. ATLAS and CMS have used their giant detectors to see hints of the Higgs decaying to muons, the middleweight sibling in the electron family, lighter than the tau but heavier than the electron. The teams have also begun checking the coupling to charm quarks, which are less massive than top and bottom quarks.
So far, the Higgs has conformed to the standard model. The big thing we discovered is it looks pretty much like we expected it to. There have been no big surprises, says theoretical particle physicist Sally Dawson of Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y.
But there might be discrepancies that just havent been detected yet. The standard model predictions agree with measured couplings within error bars of around 10 percent or more. But no one knows if they agree to within 5 percent, or 1 percent. The more precisely scientists can measure these couplings, the better they can test for any funny business.
Before the LHC turned on, scientists had a clear favorite for a physics theory that could solve some of the standard models woes: supersymmetry, a class of theories in which every known particle has an undiscovered partner particle. Physicists had hoped such particles would turn up at the LHC. But none have been found yet. Though supersymmetry isnt fully ruled out, the possibilities for the theory are far more limited.
With no consensus candidate among many other theories for what could be beyond the standard model, a lot of focus rests on the Higgs. Physicists hope studies of the Higgs will reveal something that might point in the right direction to untangle some of the standard models snarls. Measuring [the Higgs bosons] properties is going to tell us much more about what is beyond the standard model than anything before, Reina says.
One question that scientists are investigating in LHC smashups is whether the Higgs is truly unique. All the other known elementary particles have a quantum form of angular momentum, known as spin. But the Higgs has a spin of zero, whats known as a scalar. Other types of particles tend to come in families, so its not outlandish to imagine that the Higgs boson could have scalar relatives. It could be theres a huge scalar sector somewhere hiding and we just saw the first particle of it, Heinrich says. Supersymmetry predicts multiple Higgs bosons, but there are plenty of other ideas that envision Higgs accomplices.
Its also possible that the Higgs is not actually elementary. Combinations of particles, such as quarks, are known to make up larger particles with spins of zero. Perhaps the Higgs, like those other scalars, is made up of yet unknown smaller stuff.
While hunting for these answers, physicists will be watching closely for any connection between the Higgs behavior and other recent puzzling results. In 2021, the Muon g2 experiment at Fermilab in Batavia, Ill., reported hints that muons have magnetic properties that dont agree with predictions of the standard model. And in April, scientists with the CDF experiment which studied particle collisions at Fermilab until 2011 found that the W bosons mass is heavier than the standard model predicts.
The Higgs bosons relative newness makes it ripe for discoveries that could help sort out these quandaries. The Higgs boson is the least explored elementary particle, and it could be a door to the other mysteries we still have to uncover or to shed light on, Heinrich says.
To work out thorny puzzles, physicists sometimes talk to themselves. Fittingly, another puzzle atop scientists Higgs to-do list is whether the particle, likewise, talks to itself.
This self-coupling, how Higgs bosons interact with one another, has never been measured before. But it turns out to be really just an incredible barometer of new physics, says theoretical particle physicist Nathaniel Craig of the University of California, Santa Barbara. For example, measuring the Higgs self-coupling could suss out hidden particles that interact only with the Higgs, oblivious to any of the other standard model particles.
The Higgs self-coupling is closely related to the Higgs potential, an undulating, sombrero-shaped surface that describes the energy of the universe-pervading Higgs field. In the early universe, that potential determined how the fundamental particles gained mass, when the Higgs field first turned on.
How, exactly, that transition from massless to massive happened has some big implications for the cosmos. It could help explain how matter gained the upper hand over antimatter in the early universe. If the Higgs field did play that role in the universes beginnings, Craig says, its going to leave some fingerprints on the Higgs potential that we measure today.
Depending on the full shape of the Higgs potentials sombrero, at some point in the exceedingly distant future, the Higgs field could shift again, as it did in the early universe. Such a jump would change the masses of fundamental particles, creating a universe in which familiar features, including life, are probably obliterated.
To better understand the Higgs potential, scientists will attempt to measure the self-coupling. Theyll do it by looking for Higgs bosons produced in pairs, a sign of the Higgs interacting with itself. Thats thought to happen at less than a thousandth the rate that individual Higgs bosons are produced in the LHC, making it extremely difficult to measure.
Even with the planned High-Luminosity LHC, which will eventually collect about 10 times as much data as the LHC, scientists predict that the self-coupling will be measured with large error bars of about 50percent, assuming the standard model is correct. Thats not enough to settle the matter.
If scientists just do what theyre on track to do, were going to fall short, Duarte says. But new techniques could allow physicists to better identify double-Higgs events. Duarte is studying collisions in which two particularly high-energy Higgs bosons each decay into a bottom quark and a bottom antiquark. Using a specialized machine learning technique, Duarte and colleagues put together one of the most sensitive analyses yet of this type of decay.
By improving this technique, and combining results with those from other researchers looking at different types of decays, we have a good hope that well be able to observe [the self-coupling] definitively, Duarte says.
Despite all his passion for the Higgs, Duarte notes that there have been disappointments. After that first rush of the Higgs announcement, I was hoping for a Higgs-level discovery every year. That didnt happen. But he hasnt lost his optimism. We expect there to be another twist and turn coming up, he says. Were still hoping its around the corner.
The wait for new physics is no shock to veterans of earlier particle hunts. Meenakshi Narain, a particle physicist at Brown University in Providence, R.I., and a member of the CMS experiment, was an undergraduate student around the time the bottom quark was discovered in the 1970s. After that discovery, Narain joined the search for the top quark. Even though physicists were convinced of the particles existence, that hunt still took nearly 20 years, she says. And it took nearly 50 years to uncover the Higgs boson after it was postulated.
The standard models flaws make physicists confident that there must be more treasures to unearth. Because of her past experiences with the long-haul process of discovery, Narain says, I have a lot of faith.
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How physicists are probing the Higgs boson 10 years after its discovery - Science News Magazine
Why is Sangh Parivar engaged in rewriting history? – Deccan Herald
If one watches India's prime-time debates on the television channels or the internet, or even if one only reads news articles posted online and elsewhere, one is quite frequently confronted with the word 'narrative'.
Those who oppose the incumbent powers firmly believe they are indulging in a massive rewriting of history, obscuring facts not palatable to them and highlighting figures and events conducive to their agenda.
On the contrary, those in support of the ruling dispensation claim that their emphasis is only on "correcting" historical wrongs, which involves highlighting facts hitherto un-published, and demeaning facts which they see as instances of "historical injustice".
To an objective observer, the best route to understand who is in the more rationally or perhaps ethically justified position is to understand how history is written.
Ideally, history is written by academicians and scholars, who go through a rigorous process of peer review of their theories and accounts before they get published. How clean and transparent this review process is determining how factual any historical narrative is. In other words, the scientific method of observation, experiment and cataloguing is what dictates the global narratives of history. This hasn't been the case throughout most of history. Before the scientific revolution, history was taught more through anecdotes, i.e. personal reflection on the part of the individual scholar, and stories, i.e. fictionalised accounts of historical memories and narratives, were the order of the day when it came to the accounts of history. That is precisely the reason why the Mahabharata has references to events and entities that are considered 'impossible' by today's scientific standards. In other words, the distinction between story and history is not as old as a nave observer may assume.
Returning to the present, the attempt to revise history must be seen in the light of how the scientific method of chronological record-making proceeds. For this, a brief exposition of the scientific method itself is necessary.
The scientific method, developed not by scientists so much as by philosophers like Karl Popper, Quine, etc., is based on experimental observation and validation. In other words, what cannot be validated through observation is not considered science. Measurement or observation is key to the process here. That which cannot be substantiated through references, citations, and archaeological proofs is not considered history today.
The historical accounts of figures like Lord Ram, Prophet Muhammad, Jesus Christ, the Buddha, Arjun, Bhim or other characters in some of the great Indian epics have not been conceived on these lines. Why is this so? Did the historians of yesteryears have some insight into observation and measurement that today's 'scientific-minded' historians lack? Or was society intellectually very backward in that era - even during the days of Nalanda and Taxila, that they couldn't distinguish between fact and fiction?
A key to solving this mystery is in understanding the word measurement - a euphemism for observation in textbooks of modern science, especially those of theoretical physics pertaining to the quantum or sub-atomic realm of matter. In modern science, according to the most popular and accepted Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics, introduced to the world by Neils Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, pioneers of quantum physics, measurement is not an act separate from the one who is observing. In other words, although not many people seem to be aware of this, an act of observation is dependent on the person observing. There are no facts independent of the person checking them, just as there is no person independent of the environment he is surrounded with.
This does not mean that we can alter things by looking at them. It means that any scientific knowledge or any perception for that matter shows us not what things are but only shows us how we see things. In simpler words, any theory or piece of knowledge we acquire tells us more about ourselves and our own manners of perception rather than the thing perceived by us. In most crude language, anything we see, hear, taste, smell, feel, touch, or perceive in any possible manner, does not show us reality, but rather it shows us our brains perceiving reality.
Bringing us back to History and the battle of narratives being fought out on our television sets, computer screens and smartphones, what is the measurement or observation of a historical fact? Are the individual historians observing or researching a fact and modifying it while checking it? Are the institutions of historical scholarship and academia co-creating facts when they peer-review each other's research and publish only what is personally acceptable to their club, so to speak?
It could indeed be that historians are subconsciously or perhaps consciously changing history while observing it and that the 'clubs' of academic scholarship are being run by those who wish to dictate historical narratives based on their own self-defined notions of academic superiority and scholarship, which would even dictate what counts as 'proof'.
BJP loyalists, pejoratively called 'Bhakts' and 'Andh-Bhakts' by their opponents, might actually have a point when they question the validity of the erstwhile mainstream historical narrative or account. It is just that they're firing their bullets at the wrong target. Instead of focusing on "rewriting" while peddling it as "rediscovering" history, it would be more suitable for them to question the validity of historical narratives as being objective per se, with an as unbiased and non-political approach as possible.
In other words, we are indeed living in a 'post-truth' world, as those who keep shouting the words 'false narrative' to counter another person's point of view might have realised. But the point of realising that truth or at least knowledge is subjective is not to challenge the other person's subjectivity with one's own subjectivity, whether one supports the left, right or centre. It is to realise that we all live in our own subjective perceptual fields, which should ideally make us respect our opponent's point of view more and try to listen and learn from it. The truth will only emerge from a discussion between those who oppose and respect each other. It will not emerge from realising on the one hand that knowledge is relative and subjective and then immediately imposing this subjectivity upon another who we also acknowledge as being equally subjective.
Democracy is based on disagreement and reconciliation, not in self-imposed intellectual contradiction and forced imposition of this ailment upon others. If that were so, then we would all be mentally ill, and the whole world would be a 19th-century lunatic asylum, with no one fully communicating with anyone else, except that, in this case, even the healers and nurses would be patients with us, which is not a fantasy many of us would like to indulge in.
(The author is a research scholar)
Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.
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Why is Sangh Parivar engaged in rewriting history? - Deccan Herald
Postdoctoral / Research Fellow, Research School of Physics job with AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY (ANU) | 298867 – Times Higher Education
Classification: Academic Level A/BSalary package: $76,271 - $117,736 per annum plus 17% SuperannuationTerm:Fixed Term, Full-time appointment for 3 years
Postdoctoral, Research Fellow PD and Pewer.pdf
The Area
The Research School of Physics (RSPhys) represents Australia's largest university based research and teaching activity in the physics discipline.
The underlying impetus of our research is a belief in the fundamental importance of physics to all of science and technology and the key role physics must play in addressing the challenges facing the modern world. For example, in addressing climate change, we must better understand the physics of the atmosphere and develop new clean sources of energy. In medicine, further development of new procedures, such as positron therapy for cancer treatment, will not be possible without advancing the basic physics that underlies them. The communications revolution that is changing the world is driven by physics, and if progress is to continue, research must harness advances in electronic materials, lasers and optoelectronic devices. There is no better place to study and research physics than the Research School of Physics at The Australian National University.
The School is home to the Department of Quantum Science and Technology (DQST), which conducts fundamental and applied research in ultra-cold quantum gases, quantum optics, atomic physics, and quantum computing.
The Position
Based in the Atomlaser and Quantum Sensors Group within DQST, the Postdoctoral/Research Fellow will work closely with Professor John Close on the experimental implementation of a scheme to produce spin-squeezing on the existing Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) and atom interferometry apparatus. This experiment will take place on the existing ANU BEC atom interferometry experiment and uses a modification of the standard Mach-Zehnder scheme.
The Postdoctoral/Research Fellow will also interact closely with theoretical physicists Dr. Simon Haine and Professor Joe Hope, and our research collaborators Professor Mathew Davis, Dr Stuart Szigeti, and Dr. Sebastian Wuster.
The Person
To excel in this role you will have:
The Australian National University is a world-leading institution and provides a range of lifestyle, financial and non-financial rewards and programs to support staff in maintaining a healthy work/life balance whilst encouraging success in reaching their full career potential. For more information, please click here.
To see what the Science at ANU community is like, we invite you to follow us on social media at Instagram and Facebook.
For more information about the position please contact Dr Simon Haine on T: +61 474964745 or E: simon.haine@anu.edu.au.
ANU Values diversity and inclusion and is committed to providing equal employment opportunities to those of all backgrounds and identities. People with a disability are encouraged to apply. For more information about staff equity at ANU, click here.
Application information
In order to apply for his role, please make sure that you upload the following documents:
Applications which do not address the selection criteria may not be considered for the position.
Please note: The successful candidate will be required to undergo a background check during the recruitment process. An offer of employment is conditional on satisfactory results.
Job Close: 31 July 2022
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University of Luxembourg: Where students create a more sustainable future – Study International News
From our climate to our environment, from the tech we use to the state of our economies, things are changing fast faster than our efforts to create a more sustainable future.
The University of Luxembourg makes it its mission to be a role model for sustainable and responsible development. Its ambition is to tackle various global sustainability challenges in many areas, from social, economic and legal topics to engineering, science and environmental issues.
As part of its efforts to increase awareness on sustainability, almost all programmes at the University of Luxembourg offer courses or lectures relating to sustainability. Source: University of Luxembourg
The University of Luxembourgs faculties provide learning opportunities and research programmes that relate to sustainability. Its Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences (FHSE) offers the Certificate in Sustainable Development and Social Innovation taught in English for professionals and students from all levels and degree programmes.
Here, students gain an understanding of the complex challenges that societies, organisations and individuals face in the limits of the biophysical carrying capacity of the planet. They become change agents that engage with complexity, contingency (situated knowledge), contradictions, uncertainty and ignorance.
If youre looking for a programme centred on science, head to the Faculty of Science, Technology and Medicine (FSTM). It offers three programmes taught in English: Master of Science in Engineering Sustainable Product Creation, Master of Science in Physics and Master of Science in Civil Engineering Megastructure Engineering with Sustainable Resources.
For those interested in geography or spatial planning relating to sustainability, FHSE offers two masters programmes taught in English as well: Master in Architecture and Master in Geography and Spatial Planning.
The Master of Science in Engineering provides students with a comprehensive understanding of all relevant aspects of the product creation process, including sustainable product creation. Meanwhile, students in the Master of Science in Physics programme will gain a broad advanced physics education, with lectures covering the limitations of energy consumption and renewable production. For the Master of Science in Civil Engineering, aspiring engineers will focus on two themes megastructures and sustainability. They will learn to plan and construct megastructures with the use of sustainable resources.
The University of Luxembourgs Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance (FDEF) is just as innovative. It aims to increase students awareness on sustainability. Most of its bachelors and masters programmes in economics and management offer introductory lectures on sustainable development and the economy, plus optional courses on ecological economics.
Thats not all. Part of the universitys long-term plan is to weave sustainable finance into all course units to foster students knowledge, skills and competencies relating to sustainability.
Students are heavily involved in the universitys research and outreach on sustainability too. Source: University of Luxembourg
The University of Luxembourgs research in this area is just as prolific. Research units across all three faculties and three interdisciplinary centres are developing and conducting projects that focus on sustainability. Some of its major recent projects include launching signing a five-year agreement to create and finance the Paul Wurth Chair in Energy Process Engineering, collaborating with the city of Esch-Sur-Alzette to establish a new endowed Chair in urban regeneration, awarded FNR ATTRACT funding to conduct research on quantum physics, teaming up with institutes to accelerate the transition to a sustainable energy landscape, and joining Inspiring More Sustainability (the leading network of Luxembourg companies and organisations committed to corporate social responsibility).
Students play key roles in these projects and outreach initiatives. Neeraj Podichetty, a 2021 graduate of the Master in Logistics and Supply Chain Management at the Luxembourg Centre for Logistics and Supply Chain Management, was recently awarded an FNR Aides la Formation-Recherche (AFR) grant to calculate the reduction in carbon footprint offered by sustainable practices in maritime shipping. Podichetty, together with Prof. Anne Lange, are developing precise mathematical models to measure the level of carbon reduction attained when companies share resources such as ships, thereby increasing their load and lowering the amount of emissions per container.
The faculty at the University of Luxembourg has been very supportive since the time I reached out to them regarding my plan and proposal to pursue a PhD, says Podichetty. My supervisor, Prof. Anne Lange, provided me with the right guidance on how to write the research proposal for AFR funding and how I could leverage my previous experience in the industry.
These students and staff stand out reflecting how future-forward the University of Luxembourg is. It is kicking off plans to mobilise its community and respond to urgent and essential sustainability needs. Greenhouse gas balance of the universitys activities will be calculated. Students and staff are looking into carpooling and bicycling more. Events are set to follow best practices to reduce their impact to the environment. University restaurants will transition to more local and organic food.
Such efforts illustrate how the University of Luxembourg is supporting a more effective transition to sustainability. More importantly, it shows how it empowers students to address diverse sustainability challenges. Find out how you can be part of the universitys global sustainability efforts here.
Follow the University of Luxembourg on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTube
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University of Luxembourg: Where students create a more sustainable future - Study International News
Scientist Reveals ‘Quantum Entanglement’ May Explain the Mind Existing as a Field Separate From the Brain – The Epoch Times
The relationship between the mind and the brain is a mystery that is central to how we understand our very existence as sentient beings. Some say the mind is strictly a function of the brain consciousness is the product of firing neurons. But some strive to scientifically understand the existence of a mind independent of, or at least to some degree separate from, the brain.
The peer-reviewed scientific journal NeuroQuantology brings together neuroscience and quantum physics a crossroads that some scientists have used to explore this fundamental relationship between mind and brain.
An article published in NeuroQuantologys September 2017 edition reviews and expands on current theories of consciousness that arise from this meeting of neuro and quantum sciences.
Dr. Dirk K.F. Meijer, a professor at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, hypothesizes that consciousness resides in a field surrounding the brain, a field which lies in another dimension. It shares information with the brain through a concept known as quantum entanglement, among other processes. This has certain similarities with a black hole.
This field may be able to pick up information from the Earths magnetic field, dark energy, and other sources. It then transmits wave information into the brain tissue, that is instrumental in high-speed conscious and subconscious information processing,wrote Dirk.
In other words, the mind is a field that exists around the brain; it picks up information from outside and communicates it into the brain at an extremely fast speed.
He described this field alternately as a holographic structured field, a receptive mental workspace, a meta-cognitive domain, and the global memory space of the individual.
Theres an unsolved mystery in neuroscience called the binding problem.Different parts of the brain handle different tasks: some work on processing color, some on processing sound, etc. But thisall somehow comes together as a unified perception, or consciousness.
Information merges and interacts in the brain more quickly than can be explained by current understandings of neural transmissions in the brain.It thus seems the mind is more than just neurons firing in the brain.
Neuroscientists are still searching for a mechanism behind this binding of disparate parts of the brains information processing. Meijerhas turned to quantum entanglement and tunneling for part of the answer.
Quantum entanglement is where particles appear to be connected despite vast distances between them. When actions are performed on one of the particles, corresponding changes are observed on the others simultaneously and instantaneously.
Quantum tunneling is a phenomenon where a particle tunnels through a barrier it shouldnt be able to according to classical physics.
These quantum phenomena allow for processes so rapid exceeding the speed of lightthey cant be explained with classical physics. So they could help explain ultra-fast subconscious mental processes.
If a mind or mental field could interact with the brain this way, that could be a step toward explaining the rapidity of mental processes.Meijer also used the wave-particle fluctuation of matter in quantum physics to explain the relationship between the mental field and brain. The idea is that particles, such as electrons and photons, exist as waves of probability, but also exist as particles in the event of those probabilities collapsing.
Similarly, Meijer said the mental field is both non-material and, simultaneously, part of the physical brain: The proposed mental workspace is regarded to be non-material, but in relation to the individual brain, entertains a non-dual wave/particle relation according to quantum physical principles: it is directly dependent on the brain physiology but not reducible to it.
The mind and the brain, said Meijer, are connected. They are unified, yet separate. Such an apparent paradox is a signature of quantum physics.
He hypothesizes that the mental field lies in another dimension: That we cannot directly perceive this information aspect is traditionally ascribed to a hidden fourth spatial dimension which cannot be observed in our 3-D world, but can be mathematically derived.
This fourth spatial dimension isnt time. Rather, it is a concept of space-time which includes four spatial dimensions, plus time a 4+1 space-time structure.
He cited studies that have suggested this concept of dimensions could reconcile the mismatches between traditional physics and quantum physics that plague scientists today.
Thus, the mind would exist in the fourth spatial dimension.
Meijer envisions a sort of screen or boundary between the outside world and the individual mental field. He likens this boundary to the event horizon of a black hole.
It is assumed that information entering a black hole from the outside is not lost, but rather is being projected on its outer screen, called the event horizon, Meijer wrote.
Consciousness is a boundary condition between a singularity (black hole) and space within the brain, he added, noting that the event horizon separates a mental model of reality for internal use in each individual from all that exists outside of it. Yet it is connected to a universal information matrix.
This dynamic holographic boundary collects information from inside the brain as well as from the information fields in which our brain is permanently embedded, he told The Epoch Times. In this manner, it is implicitly connected to a universal information matrix.
The geometrical shape known as a torus is well suited for the nature and functions Meijer attributes to this mental field.
A torus is described by the Merriam Webster dictionary as a doughnut-shaped surface generated by a circle rotated about an axis in its plane that does not intersect the circle.
Meijer presented various reasons related to physics theories for this shape. One is related to a theory of how electrical activity in the brain oscillates.
The torus structure is found in physics from the microscale, to the extreme macroscale of black holes, and the universe as a whole, Meijer explained. It could be instrumental in dynamically integrating information in the mind and brain.
Our paper, may directly contribute to an answer on the famous question of [cognitive scientists and philosopher David] Chalmers : how can something immaterial like subjective experience and self-consciousness arise from a material brain?Meijer wrote.
The ability of the mental field to pick up information from other fields, as conceived by Meijer, could also explain some anomalous phenomena, such as extrasensory perception, he noted.
In his view, consciousness can be regarded as the most basic building block of nature and consequently is present at all levels of the fabric of reality.
Since quantum physics emerged, scientists have been exploring its ability to explain consciousness, which Meijers work fits into.
Another theory called orchestrated objective reduction, or Orch-OR, was developed by physicist Sir Roger Penrose and anesthesiologist Dr. Stuart Hameroff, which on Hameroffswebsite hedescribesthusly: It suggests consciousness arises from quantum vibrations in protein polymers called microtubules inside the brains neurons.
Like Meijer, Penrose and Hameroff believethere is a connection between the brains biomolecular processes and the basic structure of the universe. They have also called for a major change in how scientists view consciousness.
Hameroff said in an interview with the blog Singularity: Most scientists cant explain consciousness in the brain, so they cant say that consciousness out of the brain is impossible.
Update:Dr. Dirk Meijer has provided The Epoch Times with an update on his paper, clarifying that quantum tunneling and entanglement are not the most likely methods of information transfer between the mental field and the brain. These two phenomena have been shown to provide only a correlation between two particles, not necessarily information transfer (although that may prove to be the case with further research).
Rather, quantum wave resonance is a more likely mechanism of extremely rapid information processing in the brain. This means, instead of signals being sent between neurons in the brain, a wave pattern that encompasses all neurons, as well as the mental field, transmits the information instantaneously.
Picture a vibration wave going up and down in a consistent pattern and running all through your brain and even outside of it. That pattern communicates information that can be understood by vibratory receptors in your brain. All of this is happening in a dimension and at a microscopic level not directly perceptible through conventional scientific instrumentation at our disposal today, yet can be inferred through physical and mathematical modeling.
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Deciding to Read This Article Isn’t The Result of Gravity Crushing Your Quantum Spirit – ScienceAlert
A few years ago, deep beneath the Apennine Mountains in Italy, a team of physicists hunted for flashesof light that just might suggest human consciousness is the product of gravitational forces.
The fact they came up empty-handed doesn't mean we're all meat computers with no free will; it does make the quest for a suitable model explaining consciousness far more of a challenge, however.
If the idea of having no free will is uncomfortable, you're not alone. In the 1990s, Nobel laureate Roger Penrose and an anesthesiologist named Stuart Hameroffargued that quantum properties of cellular structures called microtubules might introduce enough wiggle room for brains to break free from the 'one input, one output' restrictions of classical mechanics.
While their hypothesis, called Orchestrated Objective Reduction (Orch OR), sits on the fringes of physics and biology, it's nonetheless complete enough to provide researchers with predictions that can be investigated scientifically.
"What I loved about this theory was that it is in principle testable, and I decided to search for evidence that might help confirm or falsify it," says physicist Catalina Curceanu from the Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati in Italy.
Penrose's and Hameroff's concept might be testable, but it still rests on a mountain of assumptions about the way physics and neurology function on a fundamental level.
Fundamental to quantum mechanics is the notion that all particles exist as a range of possibilities unless they're in some way quantified by a measurement.
Exactly what this means isn't clear, leading some to interpret the difference as a 'collapse' of the wave-like haze of maybes into a concrete absolute of hard reality.
Equally beguiling is the question of why a swarm of possible values should at all settle on any one measurement.
One idea championed by Penrose and colleague Lajos Disi in the late 20th century suggested the curvature of space-time might favor some possibilities over others.
To put it another way, mass and its gravitational pull could somehow be squashing quantum waves flat.
Applying this assumption to competing quantum states of cellular material namely the tubulin shuffling chemicals around inside neurons Penrose and Hameroff calculated the time it would take for quantum effects to translate into mechanisms that would affect consciousness.
While their model stops well short of explaining why you made a conscious choice to read this article, it does show how neurochemistry can deviate from classical computational operations into something less restrictive.
Penrose's and Disi's gravitational collapse idea has been tested before, by none other than Disi himself. Their experiment in the Gran Sasso National Laboratory examined the simplest of collapse scenarios, finding no sign that the hypothesis was accurate.
In light of those findings, the team now asks how their previous results might affect Penrose's and Hameroff's Orch OR hypothesis.
Their critical analysis of the model suggests at least one interpretation of the hypothesis can now be ruled out. Given what we know about quantum physics, the distribution of tubulin within our neurons, and constraints imposed by Disi's previous experiments, it's hugely unlikely that gravity is tugging at the strings of consciousness.
At least, not in this specific manner.
"This is the first experimental investigation of the gravity-related quantum collapse pillar of the Orch OR consciousness model, which we hope will be followed by many others," says Curceanu.
Exactly what it would mean if any investigation found a glimmer of proof for Orch OR is hard to say. Non-computational descriptions of consciousness aren't just hard to study; they're challenging to define. Even indisputable programs that echo human thinking challenge our efforts to spot examples of sentience, self-awareness, and free will.
Yet the idea that biological systems are too chaotic for delicate quantum behaviors to emerge has weakened in light of the evidence of entanglement playing a role in functions such as navigation in birds.
Just maybe a flash of inspiration is all we need to put us on a path to understanding the physics of our very souls.
This research was published in Physics of Life Reviews.
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The recluse who confronted the mystery of the universe – Business Standard
In early October 2013, the Nobel Prize committee was preparing to announce the winner of its award in physics. The leading candidate as pretty much everyone knew was an 84-year-old Scottish scientist named Peter Higgs, who was not feeling nearly as joyful as you might think. Yes, he wanted to win the award, yes, he wanted to be recognised for his pioneering insights into how subatomic particles build our universe. He just wanted to be recognised for it quietly.
But as a theorist already heralded for his 1964 work predicting the Higgs boson (sometimes called the God particle), he knew he was pipe-dreaming. He could almost hear the thunder of microphone-wielding journalists advancing on his Edinburgh apartment. So he made a pre-emptive decision: I decided not to be home. On the morning of the announcement, Higgs crept out his back door, caught a bus to a nearby town, tucked himself into a pub and hunkered down with a medicinal pint of ale.
Thus, when Higgs did win the Nobel (along with the French physicist Franois Englert), neither journalists nor fellow physicists could find him. We dont know where he is, one University of Edinburgh colleague sadly explained to an exasperated reporter. One is left to wonder if Frank Close chose the title for Elusive as a reference to the glimmering subatomic particle of Higgss theory or to the theorist himself.
As Close notes, Peter Higgs has managed to avoid much of the pace of modern life. He does his best to avoid both email and cell phones. Close, a physicist himself and the author of numerous popular science books, is a long-time colleague and friend of Higgss, but to research this volume he was forced to mail reminder letters to confirm appointments. Their conversations, not entirely revealing, were mostly conducted via Higgss treasured landline phone. As a result, although his publisher describes Elusive as the first major biography of Peter Higgs, Close seems less sure of that, describing his book as not so much a biography of the man but of the boson named after him.
Closes description is more accurate. The biographical facts add up to more of a brisk sketch than a richly detailed portrait. This is not to deny that there are moments of sharp and even bitter insight: Higgss belief that his antisocial personality developed during a sickly and lonely childhood in northern England I grew up a rather isolated child; his marriage and its failure because of his workaholic habits; a resulting, paralysing depression; his dedication to social justice causes, which at one point led him to suspect that he had become an embarrassment to some of his colleagues. After all, Higgs notes modestly, The portion of my life for which I am known is rather small three weeks in the summer of 1964.
It is those three weeks that anchor the real story in this book, a clear, vivid and occasionally even beautiful portrait of a scientific breakthrough: the tale of how a relatively obscure Scotland-based physicist developed a stunning theory, one that would help illuminate the invisible, particulate web that holds our universe together. And how in the following decades, the research community would argue, debate, build and expand on his idea, setting out on a quest to confirm the existence of the Higgs boson and with it our own understanding of the universe.
At a basic level, Higgss theory belongs to a fundamental and puzzling question: Where does the mass of the universe come from? Using the known rules of physics, from electromagnetism to quantum mechanics, Higgs raised the possibility of an unstable subatomic particle that, through a series of fizzing interactions, could lend mass to other particles. He predicted this particle would be a boson a notably massive subatomic particle that helps hold matter together and that it would exist in an energy field that enabled the interactions. Higgs suggested a path to confirming the existence of the boson and the eventual measurement of its decay products. In doing so, Close writes, the theory issued a subtle challenge: Is this just a clever piece of mathematics or does nature really work this way?
Close uses that question as a launching point, taking the reader through much of the history of particle physics and introducing the key players, the insights by others in the field who moved the ideas forward and the eventual decision to build a machine in Switzerland the Large Hadron Collider to test the possibilities. The LHC would find confirmation for the bosons decay products in 2012. Close brings to this story an insiders knowledge and a combat-ready willingness to defend Higgs against his occasional critics, at one point dismissing the high-profile British physicist Stephen Hawking as a man with a singular genius for playing the media.
In other words, this is a very human telling of the ways that weve figured out at least some of the mysteries of our universe since the mid-20th century. What does the discovery reveal about the cosmos and our place in the universe? Close wonders, and he ends his book on a note of additional mystery, reminding us that there are great achievements in physics to come and that tantalising questions still shine in front of us, their answers still out of reach, ever elusive.
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The recluse who confronted the mystery of the universe - Business Standard
Thinking Like a Scientist Will Make You Happier – Nautilus
Jim Al-Khalili has an enviable gig. The Iraqi-British scientist gets to ponder some of the deepest questionsWhat is time? How do natures forces work?while living the life of a TV and radio personality. Al-Khalili hosts The Life Scientific, a show on BBC Radio 4 featuring his interviews with scientists on the impact of their research and what inspires and motivates them. Hes also presented documentaries and authored popular science books, including a novel, Sun Fall, about the crisis that unfolds when, in 2041, Earths magnetic field starts to fail. His latest book, The Joy of Science, is his response to a different crisis.
The Joy of Science was motivated by this sense that a lot of us have, that public discourse is becoming increasingly polarized, Al-Khalili tells Nautilus. There seems to be a rise in irrational, anti-scientific thinking, and conspiracy theories. And theres no room for debate, particularly amplified by the internet and social media. His message is that we should all be thinking more critically. If we could export some of the ideas of science, when science is done well, into everyday life, I think we would all be happier, more empowered.
Al-Khalili tells me that doling out advice is quite the departure for him. But after a long career in physics and science communication, he says with a laugh, Ive reached that stage where I arrogantly think I can impart wisdom to the world. In our interview, Al-Khalili discusses, among other things, the unprecedented level of cognitive dissonance nowadays, whats wrong with Occams razor, and whether ideological thinking conflicts with a scientific mindset. He also defends scientific realism, and walks me through a puzzle about light that Einstein dreamt up as a teenager.
What drove you to write a book about living by the scientific method now?
We are bombarded by information all the time, and your average person really doesnt know who or what to trust. But we can learn to know who and what to trust. We can employ some of the ways that we do scienceexamining biases, the importance of uncertainty, being prepared to change your mind in the light of new evidence. Those sorts of things go against human nature because we want to be right about our opinions. We dont like to be told we are wrong. But thats not the way we do things in science.
Do you have a memorable example of a scientist admitting they made a mistake?
I have a lovely story. A few years ago, I made a documentary for the BBC called Gravity and Me. Wed finished filming, and I was due to go into the studio to do the voiceover, and it was due to be aired on British TV a few weeks later, and we discovered that Id made a mistake. I was trying to explain the idea of clocks running at different rates in Earths gravity. Because time runs slower, not just when you travel close to the speed of light, but also when you are in a strong gravitational field. We went back to the BBC and said, Look, hold on to the transmission. Weve made a mistake. And they said, Fine. Well do that. Reshoot all the stuff that you got wrong and put in the correct stuff and that will be the wiser.
And I said, Actually, this is a really good opportunity to explain how science works and that we do make mistakes and that its okay to make mistakes. How about if I make it as part of the documentary? I say, Unfortunately, at this point I realized Id got it wrong and in fact, its such and such.' And the guys at BBC, the commissioning editor, were quite nervous about this. They said, Oh, Jim, we are concerned about your reputation as a professor of physics if you admit your mistake publicly like that. I said, Well, clearly you dont understand how science works. Its not something to be ashamed of to admit you are wrong.
And I stood by my guns and we absolutely made sure that was part of the documentary. I was getting emails from people after, saying, Oh, Jim, youre so brave to admit your mistake. I said, No. Its great. I mean, thats how we learn, thats how we do science. Theres nothing wrong with that.
Science is carried out and funded by humans with various biases and motives. But would you say it still is a uniquely trustworthy enterprise?
This is not an easy issue. Science of course is very broad. In my area of research in theoretical physics, to a large extent it is value-free. The equations of quantum mechanics that I might come up with or write down will be exactly the same, whether theyre discovered by physicists in China or Russia. Theres a universality about the laws of physics that transcend cultures and political ideologies. But of course there are lots of areas of science, particularly in the social sciences, dealing with the complexity of human behavior, where its difficult to avoid value judgements and biases. And thats just the way scientists have to behave, to try and remove biases, or examine their own biases.
Einstein believed theres a real world out there and its sciences job to get as close as we can to that truth.
Its even more difficult for the wider public, who are not trained in science, to know who to trust and what to trust. You see something on YouTube or you read an article onlinehow do you know (a) whether its good science and its based on firm evidence and data, and (b) whether whoever is getting that idea across has their own vested interests? Many scientists work for corporations and industry, in the pay of people who do have other vested interests, so it is difficult.
My message is that you shouldnt take a lot of these ideas at face value. We have to invest some effort into digging in to find out whether something comes from a reputable source or not. To some extent, we may have to rely on technology to help us do that filtering. But even that comes with its dangers. Whos creating the AI thats telling you what is fake news and what is good news? As a society, we have to have this discussion because we need to know how to discriminate among all the information that we are being bombarded with every day.
How confident are you that AI can be relied on to show us trustworthy information?
Well, Im quite nervous about how well we can utilize AI. But we are going to have to use AI to help us filter the trustworthy information from the misinformation and disinformation. But the problem is, who creates that AI algorithm? If its Google or Facebook that is filtering what we receive, and they say, Look, weve removed all this other stuff because thats misinformation. Well, who says? Is that AI built by someone with an ideological stance? Were going to have to figure out ways of making sure that AI is completely neutral on this matter. Maybe its providing us with a forum where we can debate things a bit more rationally and civilly than we are at the moment. Theres too much information out there for us as a society to develop our own rational skills to decide for ourselves. Were going to have to make use of technology, but we have to be very careful about how we implement it.
How helpful is Occams razorthe idea of favoring simple explanationsin deciding where to place our trust?
William of Occam was this medieval monk who actually lived very near to my university, University of Surrey in England, and the razor thats named after him is simply that if you have lots of different explanations, chances are the simplest one is the right one. That served us well in science, but there are dangerous pitfalls because things arent always as simple as wed like them to be. And when you apply that in everyday life, its even more problematic because we are living in a world now where we want the simplest explanation.
Dont blind me with details. This is what I believe, this simple idea. And this is what Im going to go with. Very often, issues that we have to deal with in everyday life are more complicated. Not everything can be reduced to a meme or a tweet. And yet we see the problems we have today, with the polarization of ideologies, particularly on social media, where each side is so absolute and certain in their position, and they dont want to acknowledge that actually an issue is more complex, more complicated, more nuanced.
How would you revise Occams razor?
Maybe, Its not the simplest explanation that is the right one, but the most useful explanation. It could be that sometimesand certainly in science if we want to describe a conceptit is more complicated than wed like it to be, and we have to acknowledge that and bite that bullet.
In the book, you mention a thought experiment that Einstein, as a teenager, came up with to get a handle on the unintuitive behavior of light. He wondered: If you were traveling at the speed of light, holding a mirror in front of your face, would you see your reflection? How do you answer that?
The issue is if you are flying at the speed of light and the mirror is in front of you, to see your face reflected in the mirror, light has to bounce off your face, onto the mirror, and then back into your eyes again. But if you are traveling at the speed of light, how can light ever overtake you, reach the mirror and come back again?
The answer is, Yes, we will always see our reflection because Einsteins theory of relativity tells us that all motion is relative. Im traveling at the speed of lightaccording to what reference? There will always be a frame of reference in which I can say, Im not moving at all. And this is Einsteins great breakthrough in 1905, his special theory of relativity, which says that the speed of light is absolute. It doesnt matter how fast youre moving, you will always see light traveling at that same speed, the maximum speed in our universe.
Learn that theres no shame in changing your mind in the light of new information.
And so me flying, holding a mirror in front of my face, will be no different to me standing still holding a mirror in front of my face. I always see my reflection. Relativity theory forces us to rethink the notion of distances and time intervals. The example I always give to my students is, if I shine a torch out into the sky, so the light from the torch is traveling at the speed of light away from me, here standing on Earth, and then you, Brian, jump in a rocket and fly off at, say, 99 percent of the speed of light, trying to catch that light beam traveling parallel to it, I would see the light beam overtaking you, slowly at 1 percent of the speed of light, because you arent going nearly as fast as it and that also makes logical sense. But for you in the rocket, you see that same light beam going past you, at the same speed that I see it leaving my torch. So something has to give, and what gives is our notion of the flow of time.
I would see your time as running much more slowly than mine. Your seconds are ticking by slowly. Thats why you see the light beam going past you very quickly, because your time is running slower. One second for you, the light beam has gone past you very quickly, but for me I can see it creeping past. So the notions of distance and time change. And thats where relativity theory becomes counterintuitive and fun to teach.
Do you think we can know reality, the world out there, as it truly is, or is it more complicated than that?
This is an age-old question and it particularly came to the fore a century ago with the development of quantum mechanics: the most counterintuitive idea in science, the theory of the subatomic world. Famously there were long-running debates between the leading physicists of the time, Einstein versus the Danish physicist Niels Bohr. Einstein was a realist. He believed theres a real world out there and its sciences job to get as close as we can to that truth. In The Joy of Science, I lay my cards on the table. I would side with Einstein on that one. We may never reach it, but the world is the way it is. We cant make up our own narrative. We cant decide on our own reality. But Niels Bohr, the father of quantum mechanicsthe guy was a geniuswould argue that the job of science isnt to find out how the world is, because we can never find out how it is. The job of science is to see what we can say based on what we see, our perception, of how the world is. We can never say how the world really is.
Do you feel like thats a cop out?
Yes. We should say theres a real world out there, and its our job to try and find ways of breaking out from the models that we create in our mindsthe reality that we construct in our mindsthat we hope reflects what the real world is like. I dont see any reason why we should absolve ourselves from that responsibility.
Why do you say that cognitive dissonance is far more serious in our modern culture and times than it has ever been?
Cognitive dissonance, the idea that well have a view and then well be confronted with something that goes completely against it, is something that happens to us on a daily basis. Pre-internet, we tended to read the newspaper or get our news from a source that we felt that aligned with our worldview. To a large extent, we still do that now, but what has changed is that the internet and social media and YouTube have amplified the problem, because we are now exposed to the opposing views in a very real way, far more than wed ever been before. Confirmation bias, you like to hear what you already believe in, was much easier in the past. Life was simpler.
Today we are confronted with having to deal with information coming from across the whole spectrum, for any particular issue, whether its political, ideological, or religious. And we adopt a defense mechanism against that, which is to reject the views that we dont like, that we dont agree with. And my argument is, Hang on. Dont be so hasty in rejecting it, however uncomfortable it makes you feel. Learn that theres no shame in changing your mind in the light of new information.
The term ideology comes up quite a bit in your book. Would you say people should generally avoid making ideological commitments if they want to think about things more scientifically?
I dont think so. Ideology can mean anything. Some people even refer to science as an ideology. There are certain beliefs in science, whether you believe in the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics or not, that become almost like an ideology. But no, this is part of human nature, that we have a worldview. We have a political view. We have a moral compass. We believe something is right and something is wrong. This changes, of course. What was acceptable a hundred years ago clearly isnt acceptable now and vice versa. So, holding ideological views is absolutely part of the human condition. Its just that we should try a bit harder to examine and question why we hold those ideological views and not be so certain, so absolute about them.
Why should we question our motives for believing what we think is true?
Its the way we do things in science. We constantly test our own ideas and because we know if we are wrong about something, other scientists eventually will discover it. Of course, some scientists will stick to their guns no matter what, but they dont last long. Those ideas dont survive very long. Just because you want something to be true or you want something to be correct, doesnt make it so. I think its a nice lesson that wider society could adopt. Being able to admit you are wrong, to change your mind, in science is a strength, unlike in politics, where its regarded as a weakness, right? Politicians dont like to admit mistakes or that theyre wrong. Wouldnt it be refreshing if they could say, Oh, actually. No, youve got a good point there. Ive changed my mind. I now think this.
Has your joy of science changed at all as youve gotten older and learned more?
Probably, it has increased rather than diminished. I dont feel theres going to come a time where I say, Okay, Im done with science. I want to go and play golf or travel around the world. I want to be able to do that, of course, but I dont think my love for science will diminish at all. I dont plan to retire, much to my wifes annoyance.
Brian Gallagher is an associate editor at Nautilus. Follow him on Twitter @bsgallagher.
Lead image: Intararit / Shutterstock
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Global Mobility Call becomes the cornerstone for business and governments to build the future sustainable mobility – PR Newswire
Global Mobility Call brought together more than 4,500 on-site attendees and 13,000 online attendees from 40 countries, with more than 1.3 million views of the live programme. In addition, 250 journalists have covered the more than 100 multi-sector dialogues, where over 300 panelists, representatives from public and private sectors, entrepreneurs, academics and experts have presented proposals, ideas, reports and reflections on the rapid processes of changes in mobility.
Among the main conclusions was the need to carry out national and international projects that promote digitalisation, decarbonisation, connectivity, intermodal and multimodal transport, industrial transformation, urban design, improvement of rural transport, funding and professional services.
The President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Snchez, closed the Global Mobility Call by stating that this forum "is the best example of the capacity for resilience, ambition to transform, the essential collaboration between the public and private sectors, the strength of companies and of Spanish society as a whole. Both private and public sectors share a special ability to face difficulties and adapt to new scenarios".
He has underlined that the uncertainties provoked by the war "should not delay" the sustainable mobility transformation.
In closing the event, the President of the Executive Committee of IFEMA MADRID, Jos Vicente de los Mozos, explained that these days at Global Mobility Call have shown "the inspiration and the keys to enter into business of enormous proportions, for which priority is to access recovery funds", while the event has generated "content and professional networking, which will translate into a real boost for sustainable mobility".
"We have to process the vast content and contacts of highest interest which have been produced during these days. It will be our job to organise and make this important legacy available to the different sectors and the thousands of professionals who have participated in Global Mobility Call", he said.
Global Mobility Call has responded to the need to bring together all mobility actors at a time of profound transformation. The need to act on both climate and energy crises, seizing the opportunity provided by the EUR 800 billion NextGenerationEU European recovery funds, has made Global Mobility Call an unprecedented opportunity to shape the future of a decarbonised, safe, digitised mobility, which respects the planet and the people's health, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals, the Paris Agreement and the European Green Pact.
Among the panellists, Jeffrey Sachs, American economist and specialist in sustainable development, called for further digital development of mobility and insisted that this be approached as an integrated ecosystem of sectors, just as Global Mobility Call does.
Clotilde Delbos, CEO of Mobilize, stressed the need to work towards providing users with mobility services tailored to their needs.
Michio Kaku, physicist and futurist, predicted how the quantum physics of the future will generate computers that will connect to the brain and the robotisation of the automotive industry.
Adina Vlean, European Commissioner for Transport, highlighted the opportunity presented by the Next GenerationEU Funds to boost projects in many of Europe's mobility sectors. It was also stressed that it is important to make this coincide with the drive for energy transition, to make Europe less dependent on fossil fuels.
Monica Araya, Climate Mobility Advisor and member of the ClimateWorks & Partners' Steering Committee suggested incorporating into the sustainable mobility agenda the questions of generating employment, fostering talent and economic value, at a time when countries are trying to remain within supply chains, and society is very anxious about the climate crisis and the retraining of labour in many sectors.
Urban planner and MIT professor Carlo Ratti called for reflection on deep structural changes in the mobility of people, jobs and products, at a time of disruption accelerated by the Covid crisis and war.
More information: https://www.ifema.es/en/global-mobility-call/
CONTACTS: Marta Cacho, Directrice de la Communication, [emailprotected]Elena Valera, Presse Internacionale, [emailprotected]
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SOURCE Global Mobility Call
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What quantum information and snowflakes have in common, and what we can do about it – CU Boulder Today
Qubits are a basic building block for quantum computers, but theyre also notoriously fragiletricky to observe without erasing their information in the process. Now, new research from CUBoulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) may be a leap forward for handling qubits with a light touch.
In the study, a team of physicists demonstrated that it could read out the signals from a type of qubit called a superconducting qubit using laser lightand without destroying the qubit at the same time.
Artist's depiction of an electro-optic transducer, an ultra-thin devicethat can capture and transform the signals coming from a superconducting qubit. (Credit: Steven Burrows/JILA)
The groups results could be a major step toward building a quantum internet, the researchers say. Such a network would link up dozens or even hundreds of quantum chips, allowing engineers to solve problems that are beyond the reach of even the fastest supercomputers around today. They could also, theoretically, use a similar set of tools to send unbreakable codes over long distances.
The study, published June 15 in the journal Nature, was led by JILA, a joint research institute between CU Boulder and NIST.
Currently, theres no way to send quantum signals between distant superconducting processors like we send signals between two classical computers, said Robert Delaney, lead author of the study and a former graduate student at JILA.
Quantum computers, which run on qubits,get their power by tapping into the properties of quantum physics, or the physics governing very small things. Delaney explained the traditional bits that run your laptop are pretty limited: They can only take on a value of zero or one, the numbers that underly most computer programming to date. Qubits, in contrast, can be zeros, ones or, through a property called superposition, exist as zeros and ones at the same time.
But working with qubits is also a bit like trying to catch a snowflake in your warm hand. Even the tiniest disturbance can collapse that superposition, causing them to look like normal bits.
In the new study, Delaney and his colleagues showed they could get around that fragility. The team uses a wafer-thin piece of silicon and nitrogen to transform the signal coming out of a superconducting qubit into visible lightthe same sort of light that already carries digital signals from city to city through fiberoptic cables.
Researchers have done experiments to extract optical light from a qubit, but not disrupting the qubit in the process is a challenge, said study co-author Cindy Regal, JILA fellow and associate professor of physics at CU Boulder.
There are a lot of different ways to make a qubit, she added.
Some scientists have assembled qubits by trapping an atom in laser light. Others have experimented with embedding qubits into diamonds and other crystals. Companies like IBM and Google have begun designing quantum computer chips using qubits made from superconductors.
A quantum computer chip designed by IBM that includes four superconducting qubits. (Credit: npj Quantum Information,2017)
Superconductors are materials that electrons can speed around without resistance. Under the right circumstances, superconductors will emit quantum signals in the form of tiny particles of light, or photons, that oscillate at microwave frequencies.
And thats where the problem starts, Delaney said.
To send those kinds of quantum signals over long distances, researchers would first need to convert microwave photons into visible light, or optical, photonswhich can whiz in relative safety through networks fiberoptic cables across town or even between cities. But when it comes to quantum computers, achieving that transformation is tricky, said study co-author Konrad Lehnert.
In part, thats because one of the main tools you need to turn microwave photons into optical photons is laser light, and lasers are the nemesis of superconducting qubits. If even one stray photon from a laser beam hits your qubit, it will erase completely.
The fragility of qubits and the essential incompatibility between superconductors and laser light makes usually prevents this kind of readout, said Lehnert, a NIST and JILA fellow.
To get around that obstacle, the team turned to a go-between: a thin piece of material called an electro-optic transducer.
Delaney explained the team begins by zapping that wafer, which is too small to see without a microscope, with laser light. When microwave photons from a qubit bump into the device, it wobbles and spits out more photonsbut these ones now oscillate at a completely different frequency. Microwave light goes in, and visible light comes out
In the latest study, the researchers tested their transducer using a real superconducting qubit. They discovered the thin material could achieve this switcheroo while also effectively keeping those mortal enemies, qubits and lasers, isolated from each other. In other words, none of the photons from the laser light leaked back to disrupt the superconductor.
Our electro-optic transducer does not have much effect on the qubit, Delaney said.
The team hasnt gotten to the point where it can transmit actual quantum information through its microscopic telephone booth. Among other issues, the device isnt particularly efficient yet. It takes about 500 microwave photons, on average, to produce a single visible light photon.
The researchers are currently working to improve that rate. Once they do, new possibilities may emerge in the quantum realm. Scientists could, theoretically, use a similar set of tools to send quantum signals over cables that would automatically erase their information when someone was trying to listen in. Mission Impossible made real, in other words, and all thanks to the sensitive qubit.
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