Category Archives: Quantum Physics
An Experiment That Could Confirm the Fifth State of Matter in the Universe And Change Physics As We Know It – SciTechDaily
An experiment has been designed that could confirm the fifth state of matter in the universe and change physics as we know it. If proven correct, it would show that information is the fifth form of matter, alongside solid, liquid, gas, and plasma. In fact, information could be the elusive dark matter that makes up almost a third of the universe.
An experiment that could confirm the fifth state of matter in the universe and change physics as we know it has been published in a new research paper from the University of Portsmouth in England.
Dr. Melvin Vopson, a physicist, has already published findings indicating that information has mass and that all elementary particles, the universes smallest known building blocks, store information about themselves, similar to the way humans have DNA.
Now he has designed an experiment which if proved correct means he will have discovered that information is the fifth form of matter, alongside solid, liquid, gas, and plasma.
Dr. Vopson said: This would be a eureka moment because it would change physics as we know it and expand our understanding of the universe. But it wouldnt conflict with any of the existing laws of physics.
It doesnt contradict quantum mechanics, electrodynamics, thermodynamics, or classical mechanics. All it does is complement physics with something new and incredibly exciting.
Dr. Vopsons previous research suggests that information is the fundamental building block of the universe and has physical mass.
He even claims that information could be the elusive dark matter that makes up almost a third of the universe.
He said: If we assume that information is physical and has mass, and that elementary particles have a DNA of information about themselves, how can we prove it? My latest paper is about putting these theories to the test so they can be taken seriously by the scientific community.
Dr. Vopsons experiment proposes how to detect and measure the information in an elementary particle by using particle-antiparticle collision.
He said: The information in an electron is 22 million times smaller than the mass of it, but we can measure the information content by erasing it.
We know that when you collide a particle of matter with a particle of antimatter, they annihilate each other. And the information from the particle has to go somewhere when its annihilated.
The annihilation process converts all the remaining mass of the particles into energy, typically gamma photons. Any particles containing information are converted into low-energy infrared photons.
In the study, Dr. Vopson predicts the exact energy of the infrared photons resulting from erasing the information.
Dr. Vopson believes his work could demonstrate how information is a key component of everything in the universe and a new field of physics research could emerge.
The paper is published in the journal AIP Advances.
Reference: Experimental protocol for testing the massenergyinformation equivalence principle by Melvin M. Vopson, 4 March 2022, AIP Advances.DOI: 10.1063/5.0087175
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Visualizing the Proton through animation and film | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology – MIT News
Try to picture a proton the minute, positively charged particle within an atomic nucleus and you may imagine a familiar, textbook diagram: a bundle of billiard balls representing quarks and gluons. From the solid sphere model first proposed by John Dalton in 1803 to the quantum model put forward by Erwin Schrdinger in 1926, there is a storied timeline of physicists trying to visualize the invisible.
Now, MIT professor of physics Richard Milner, Jefferson Laboratory physicists Rolf Ent and Rik Yoshida, MIT documentary filmmakers Chris Boebel and Joe McMaster, and Sputnik Animations James LaPlante have teamed up to depict the subatomic world in a new way. Presented by MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST) and Jefferson Lab, Visualizing the Proton is an original animation of the proton, intended for use in high school classrooms. Ent and Milner presented the animation in contributed talks at the April meeting of the American Physics Society and also shared it at a community event hosted by MIT Open Space Programming on April 20. In addition to the animation, a short documentary film about the collaborative process is in progress.
Its a project that Milner and Ent have been thinking about since at least 2004 when Frank Wilczek, the Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics at MIT, shared an animation in his Nobel Lecture on quantum chromodynamics (QCD), a theory that predicts the existence of gluons in the proton. There's an enormously strong MIT lineage to the subject, Milner points out, also referencing the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded to Jerome Friedman and Henry Kendall of MIT and Richard Taylor of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory for their pioneering research confirming the existence of quarks.
For starters, the physicists thought animation would be an effective medium to explain the science behind the Electron Ion Collider, a new particle accelerator from the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science which many MIT faculty, including Milner, as well as colleagues like Ent, have long advocated for. Moreover, still renderings of the proton are inherently limited, unable to depict the motion of quarks and gluons. Essential parts of the physics involve animation, color, particles annihilating and disappearing, quantum mechanics, relativity. It's almost impossible to convey this without animation, says Milner.
In 2017, Milner was introduced to Boebel and McMaster, who in turn pulled LaPlante on board. Milner had an intuition that a visualization of their collective work would be really, really valuable, recalls Boebel of the projects beginnings. They applied for a CAST faculty grant, and the teams idea started to come to life.
The CAST Selection Committee was intrigued by the challenge and saw it as a wonderful opportunity to highlight the process involved in making the animation of the proton as well as the animation itself, says Leila Kinney, executive director of arts initiatives and of CAST. True art-science collaborations are more complex than science communication or science visualization projects. They involve bringing together different, equally sophisticated modes of making creative discoveries and interpretive decisions. It is important to understand the possibilities, limitations, and choices already embedded in the visual technology selected to visualize the proton. We hope people come away with better understanding of visual interpretation as a mode of critical inquiry and knowledge production, as well as physics.
Boebel and McMaster filmed the process of creating such a visual interpretation from behind the scenes. It's always challenging when you bring together people who are truly world-class experts, but from different realms, and ask them to talk about something technical, says McMaster of the teams efforts to produce something both scientifically accurate and visually appealing. Their enthusiasm is really infectious.
In February 2020, animator LaPlante welcomed the scientists and filmmakers to his studio in Maine to share his first ideation. Although understanding the world of quantum physics posed a unique challenge, he explains, One of the advantages I have is that I don't come from a scientific background. My goal is always to wrap my head around the science and then figure out, OK, well, what does it look like?
Gluons, for example, have been described as springs, elastics, and vacuums. LaPlante imagined the particle, thought to hold quarks together, as a tub of slime. If you put your closed fist in and try to open it, you create a vacuum of air, making it harder to open your fist because the surrounding material wants to reel it in.
LaPlante was also inspired to use his 3D software to freeze time and fly around a motionless proton, only for the physicists to inform him that such an interpretation was inaccurate based on the existing data. Particle accelerators can only detect a two-dimensional slice. In fact, three-dimensional data is something scientists hope to capture in their next stage of experimentation. They had all come up against the same wall and the same question despite approaching the topic in entirely different ways.
My art is really about clarity of communication and trying to get complex science to something that's understandable, says LaPlante. Much like in science, getting things wrong is often the first step of his artistic process. However, his initial attempt at the animation was a hit with the physicists, and they excitedly refined the project over Zoom.
There are two basic knobs that experimentalists can dial when we scatter an electron off a proton at high energy, Milner explains, much like spatial resolution and shutter speed in photography. Those camera variables have direct analogies in the mathematical language of physicists describing this scattering.
As exposure time, or Bjorken-X, which in QCD is the physical interpretation of the fraction of the protons momentum carried by one quark or gluon, is lowered, you see the proton as an almost infinite number of gluons and quarks moving very quickly. If Bjorken-X is raised, you see three blobs, or Valence quarks, in red, blue, and green. As spatial resolution is dialed, the proton goes from being a spherical object to a pancaked object.
We think we've invented a new tool, says Milner. There are basic science questions: How are the gluons distributed in a proton? Are they uniform? Are they clumped? We don't know. These are basic, fundamental questions that we can animate. We think it's a tool for communication, understanding, and scientific discussion.
This is the start. I hope people see it around the world, and they get inspired.
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There May Be A Fast Way To Observe This Never-Before-Seen Quantum Effect – IFLScience
Quantum theory has predicted many phenomena that are difficult, if not impossible, to observe in practice. One particularly tricky example is the Unruh effect, which would take longer than the age of the universe to reveal itself in straightforward experiments. However, a team of physicists have argued it is theoretically possible to shorten this process to a few hours. They're now working on ways to actually carry the idea out, hopefully catching a thermal glow that will confirm one part of our understanding of the basic laws of the universe.
The Unruh (or Fulling-Davies-Unruh) effect is thought to cause accelerating objects to be bathed in a thermal bath of electromagnetic radiation. If some immense power allowed a spacecraft to rapidly approach light speed, passengers not squashed by the extreme g forces would witness a warm glow around them. As envisaged, it's a counterpart to Hawking radiation produced by black holes, and observing either would help confirm the other. The problem for experimentalists is the amount of radiation produced under most circumstances is so low as to be effectively undetectable.
However, in Physical Review Letters physicists note you can stimulate the Unruh effect by accelerating your object in the presence of electromagnetic radiation. Although this light would normally induce other effects that would once again make the Unruh radiation undetectable, they claim to have found ways around this.
One of the mind-bending consequences of quantum theory is that there are no true vacuums pairs of subatomic virtual particles are constantly fluctuating into existence before almost immediately annihilating each other. Unruh's theory postulates objects with mass amplify these quantum fluctuations when accelerating, warming themselves and creating a thermal glow that others should be able to see.
Most acceleration simply isn't large enough to produce anything noticeable, however, and even when we apply all the power we can muster in a particle accelerator we're unlikely to witness anything. However, every photon of light passing through a vacuum increases the density of quantum fluctuations, making it more likely an accelerated particle will experience a noticeable Unruh effect.
However, an atom can also absorb the light used to stimulate Unruh radiation, raising its energy level enough to overwhelm something so subtle. This is just one of three resonant effects light can have on an atom. Observing the effect becomes a little like trying to spot a planet by the reflected light of its star. Extra starlight makes the planet brighter, but also makes it harder to see in the star's glare.
Just as astronomers mask stars to let us see their planets, University of Waterloo PhD student Barbara Sodaargues it is possible to make the atom invisible to the light so it cannot absorb any of the photons. This would prevent the absorption from obscuring our view of the Unruh radiation. Soda and co-authors call this acceleration-induced transparency.
Provided the accelerating object's path through a field of photons is right, the authors conclude we can get the Unruh effect without the absorption. We show that by engineering the trajectory of the particle, we can essentially turn off [the resonant] effects, Soda said in a statement.
Co-author Dr Vivishek Sudhir of MIT is working on designing a practical experiment to implement the idea by firing electrons at close to the speed of light through a microwave laser at the appropriate angle.
Now we have this mechanism that seems to statistically amplify this effect via stimulation, Sudhir said. Given the 40-year history of this problem, weve now in theory fixed the biggest bottleneck.
Unexpected acceleration of certain spacecraft as they flew by Earth has been attributed to the Unruh effect, but competing explanations exist. If the Unruh effect actually is the cause it would reveal a real-world influence, one we might even be able to harness.
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There May Be A Fast Way To Observe This Never-Before-Seen Quantum Effect - IFLScience
A clock beats inside the heart of every atom – Big Think
Measuring time has always been fundamental for humans, and different societies across history have developed different ways of tracking it. As I explored some years ago in my book About Time: Cosmology and Culture at the Twilight of the Big Bang, the pace of cultural evolution can often be tied to the machines available for measuring time. Almost every new timekeeping technology has ushered in new societal arrangements. What is especially remarkable about the technology we use in the modern world is that it all rests on physics operating at the atomic scale.
In the pre-industrial age, people only needed to measure years and months to a fair amount of accuracy. The position of the sun in the sky was good enough to break up the day. Timing at the level of fractions of a second was simply not needed.
Eventually, modern industry arose. Fast-moving machines came to dominate human activity, and clocks required hands that could measure seconds. In the current era of digital technology, the timing of electronic circuitry means that millionths or billionths of a second actually matter. None of the high-tech stuff we need, from our phones to our cars, can be controlled or manipulated if we cannot keep close track of it. To make technology work, we need clocks that are faster than the timing of the machines we need to control. For todays technology, that means we must be able to measure seconds, milliseconds, or even nanoseconds with astonishing accuracy.
Every timekeeping device works via a version of a pendulum. Something must swing back and forth to beat out a basic unit of time. Mechanical clocks used gears and springs. But metal changes shape as it heats or cools, and friction wears down mechanical parts. All of this limits the accuracy of these timekeeping machines. As the speed of human culture climbed higher, it demanded a kind of hyper-fast pendulum that would never wear down.
Luckily, that is what scientists found hiding inside the heart of each atom.
Every atom absorbs and emits electromagnetic radiation at special frequencies. These frequencies (and their related wavelengths) change based on the element. Expose an atom of hydrogen to the full spectrum of optical light, and it will absorb only a few frequencies (colors). Other frequencies remain untouched. In the early decades of the 20th century, the field of quantum mechanics explained this strange behavior. Quantum theory showed how the transitioning of electrons defines the interaction of light and matter. The electrons jump from one orbit around their atoms nucleus, to another.
Absorption entails an electron jumping to a more energetic orbit as a light particle, or photon, is captured. Emission is the opposite an electron jumps to a lower orbit, releasing energy as a photon is emitted. Using quantum mechanics, physicists learned how to precisely predict the frequencies of absorption and emission of all atoms, ions, and molecules.
Though no one knew it at the time, these quantum jumps would make for a new kind of clock. Frequency is nothing but inverse time (1/seconds). This means extremely accurate measurements of the transition frequency of an atom or molecule can transcribe a precise measurement of time.
In World War II, the development of radar allowed waves in the microwave region of the electromagnetic spectrum to be used in photon-atom interaction experiments. This led to the first atomic clock, which was based on ammonia molecules and their microwave frequency transitions.
Cesium atoms later became the preferred tool for time measurement, and in 1967 the second was formally defined as exactly 9,192,631,770 cycles of the cesium atoms transition frequency. Modern atomic clocks are now so precise that their accuracy is measured in terms of gaining or losing nanoseconds per day.
None of the modern miracles that facilitate our daily lives would work without these pendula inside atoms. From the GPS satellites sending and receiving signals across the globe, to the tiny switches inside your cell phone, it is the most basic aspect of modern physics quantum jumps that allows such delicate filigrees of time.
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Its literally slower than watching Australia drift north: the laboratory experiment that will outlive us all – The Guardian
On a Friday afternoon in April 1979, John Mainstone, a physics professor at the University of Queensland, rang his wife at home. He wouldnt be back that evening, he told her. For the previous 18 years, Mainstone had looked after the pitch drop experiment, a long-form demonstration of the extreme viscosity of pitch. For the first time since August 1970, the pitch was about to drip from its funnel, and Mainstone didnt want to miss it.
Pitch is a resin a viscoelastic substance derived from petroleum or coal tar, used in bitumen, and for waterproofing. Which is ironic, for as solid as it appears, pitch is fluid: at least, it is when you put it in a funnel, the sloping sides of which create a pressure gradient.
Mainstone stayed up all that Friday night. He continued to keep watch on the Saturday, eventually ringing his wife back to tell her he wouldnt be home that night, either. Still, the globule of (literally) pitch-black liquid hung by a thread from the bottom of its funnel. On Sunday evening, exhausted by his vigil, he went home. By the time he returned to work on a sleep-deprived Monday morning, the pitch had dropped into its beaker.
The pitch drop experiment,was set up by Mainstones predecessor Thomas Parnell. In 1927 Parnell heated and liquefied some pitch, poured it into a sealed funnel, and set it over the beaker inside a large bell jar. In 1930, he cut the stem of the funnel and waited.
Nearly a century later, the original experiment which has become the longest running laboratory experiment in the world stands in the foyer of the physics building in the Great Court. The jar is set inside a protective plastic cube, with an analogue Casio desk clock observing each moment as students and staff wander past. The funnel is held aloft by a brass tripod; at the bottom, a shiny black balloon of pitch hovers above the empty beaker.
It was Mainstone, taking the experiment on in 1961, who brought the pitch drop to popular attention. He also mentored its third and current custodian, Professor Andrew White, who has watched over it since Mainstones death in 2013. Like Parnell, Mainstone died without ever seeing a single drop fall. I am in no way filling Johns shoes, White insists. He was the heart and soul of this.
Mainstones dedication was legendary. In 2005, he and (posthumously) Parnell were awarded the Ig Nobel prize a satirical award noting arcane and trivial achievements in scientific research. The Ig Nobel prize aims to honour work that makes people laugh, but also makes them think.
Author Nick Earls first encountered the experiment as a medical student at UQ in the early 1980s, later writing about it in his novel Perfect Skin. It was a demonstration that all is not necessarily as it seems, he says. There is pitch something that goes into the making of roads, something we think of as totally solid and it turns out its not. Its just 230m times more viscous than water, and it flows, albeit very slowly.
How slowly? Far slower than grass growing, far slower than paint drying, White says, mock-offended by such banal comparisons (and the suggestion that this could be, well, a rather dull experiment to watch). Were talking more than 10 times slower than continental drift!
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He directs my attention to the joining of four tiles on the floor. Those tiles are moving north at 68 millimetres a year, because Australia is moving north at 68 millimetres a year. Its one of the fastest continents, as far as continental drift goes. The pitch drop is moving at least 10 times slower than that! So its literally slower than watching Australia drift north, and people log in live on the internet to watch it. Which I find really fascinating.
Its true. More than 35,000 people in 160 countries are sweating on the 10th drop of pitch. Theyll be waiting a while yet. Since Parnell cut the stem of the funnel in 1930, just nine drops have fallen: in December 1938, February 1947, April 1954, May 1962, August 1970, April 1979, July 1988 (when it became a popular exhibit at Brisbanes generation-defining Expo 1988), November 2000 and April 2014.
White prefers to call the pitch drop a demonstration, rather than an experiment, as it has never been controlled, and thus has been subject to environmental fluctuations. For its first 30 years, it sat in a cool dark cupboard. Mainstone put it on display, and the pitch maintained its average of one drop every eight years until, in the 80s, the physics building (which is named after Parnell) was air-conditioned, which blew it out to every 13 years or so.
Sometimes, the sensitivity of the pitch to environmental conditions was forgotten. At one stage, someone swapped the fluorescent lights above the display, which were very cool, to halogens, which are very hot, White says, shaking his head. No one asked anyone to change it, it was just done, and I realised that the pitch which is normally at room temperature was sitting at 60 degrees. The halogens are about 120, so it was flowing like a tap.
And yet, to this day, no one has seen a drop fall. Not at Expo (White: There were four or five people watching it, it was a hot day, I think they went out for five minutes to get some cordial), not even when a live stream was first set up for the millennial event in 2000. Mainstone was watching from London at the time.On that occasion a classic Brisbane thunderstorm disrupted the power supply, cutting the lights and camera feed.
Mainstone died of a stroke in 2013. In a cruel twist, the last drop fell in April 2014, a few months after his death. Except, it didnt technically drop. It just sort of oozed into the eight drops that had already fallen and solidified in the small beaker sitting under the funnel in a bell jar, without breaking away. Reluctantly, White swapped the beaker over, managing to source an old imperial-measurement model to match the original.
Since then, the beaker has sat in place clean, empty, yet to be blackened by a single drop of goo. The lights have been replaced with LEDs. We had a very fresh start, White says. And so, when anyone asks me when it will drop, I can genuinely say that I have no idea. Because the conditions have changed, as they have throughout most of the last 95 years. Its never been kept constant.
Just a few meters below the pitch drop experiment is a basement dedicated to quantum technology. There, White says, a lab makes pulses of light that are one hundred million billionth of a second long. And here in front of us, he says proudly, we have something that has an event every 10 to 20 years! It really captures the different timescales of the physical world around us.
He looks at the funnel. There is still quite a bit of pitch in there. The experiment, he says, will long outlive all of us. Quantum mechanics is as far as you can get from bits of coal that have been heated up and are slowly pouring through a glass tube as you can get, he says. I am glad that we got a new beaker in there, that will be good for another 100 years or so. Two, three keepers from now, itll be their problem what to do next.
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Meet QSA’s early-career researchers advancing the QIS frontier – UNM Newsroom
The Quantum Systems Accelerator has been catalyzing the quantum information science (QIS) ecosystem since its foundation in 2020 as a National QIS Research Center. In recognition of the new generation of scientists and engineers preparing to harness the advances in this fast-growing field, QSA continues its series profiling early-career researchers at the centers partner institutions. Three from the Center for Quantum Information and Control at the University of New Mexico contributed their views and explained how they maximize the deep collaborative opportunities at QSA.
Anupam Mitra
Anupam MitraAnupam Mitra is a Ph.D. candidate in Physics at The University of New Mexico and part of the Deutsch Research Group at CQuIC. He focuses on some of the building blocks of neutral atom quantum computers, which involve ultracold atoms cooled to a few micro-Kelvins above absolute zero. Mitra also studies how these ultracold atoms offer the ability to solve quantum problems by simulating model quantum systems. The exponentially large number of variables needed to understand, for example, the properties of matter and energy, make these problems ideal candidates for quantum devices instead of classical computers.
Since middle school, Mitra has been interested in the physics of interference in light waves, and he has also enjoyed building and programming computers. As an undergraduate in Physics and Computer Science at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science in Goa, India, Mitra first learned how quantum phenomena such as superposition, interference, and entanglement can be used for quantum information processing.
What excites you about this growing new field?"The ability to make intermediate-scale quantum systems has led to discoveries of previously inaccessible phenomena and new ways of understanding other quantum phenomena. More complex quantum systems will help us tackle questions about the nature of space and time, the emergence of classical physics from quantum physics, and the properties of large quantum systems. Moreover, they will allow us to have more precise measurements to investigate principles and phenomena beyond what is currently accessible. I hope the research and development in quantum information processing will help humanity, from potentially finding efficient ways to harness solar energy to improving chemical processes like nitrogen fixation."
How has QSA supported your research journey?"QSA has a broad community of researchers tackling several problems at the forefront of quantum information science and technology. Regular interactions with the wider community through seminars, panel discussions, and other events have been beneficial for the rapid exchange of ideas among groups and for sharing knowledge regarding solutions to commonly faced problems. I have benefited from these events, as well as from the broader collaborations with QSA researchers. Moreover, the center-wide discussions about common challenges and issues has reduced the duplication of efforts."
Goals"From a theoretical standpoint, it is easy to imagine ideal quantum systems with well-understood noise and error sources. However, there are always limitations to what contemporary quantum experiments can do, given the complexities introduced by a more extensive quantum system. This reality has been a challenge and a learning experience, so my short-term research goal is to advance quantum information processing with highly excited Rydberg atoms. I also want to finish my doctorate and participate in developing domain-specific robust quantum devices that augment our ability to perform precise measurements, calculate properties of matter, and solve other complex computational problems. Finally, I want to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in the field, by making it more accessible to underrepresented groups and people whose life circumstances have hindered them from accessing traditional education."
Advice to high-school students"Broadly speaking, scientific research is a collaborative human effort, so the progress we make today is based on the work of others. While many academic circumstances typically encourage us to work by ourselves, communication and exchanging knowledge are essential in science. One can learn from experts by reading their work and speaking with them. It is also essential to reach out to those who aspire to join our efforts, and especially to include groups who have been disadvantaged.
"Specifically, quantum information science and technology is a rapidly growing field that will benefit from researchers from different backgrounds. At present, many of the discussions use the language of quantum mechanics, which is heavy in linear algebra and calculus; thus, an understanding of these concepts can prepare someone better to be a part of the conversation. Most of the problems we are trying to solve are challenging enough to require contributions from many people, and therefore, we would like as many people to join us as possible."
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Pablo Poggi
Pablo PoggiPablo Poggi is a research assistant professor in Physics and Astronomy at the University of New Mexico specializing in quantum control to counteract and tailor the unwanted noise, environmental effects, and errors in quantum devices. In his theoretical research, he pushes the fundamental limitations of quantum control and studies novel methods to build, run, and benchmark quantum simulation devices.
Poggi was the lead organizer for the CQuIC summer course on quantum chaos for QSA members and the broader QIS community. Quantum chaos examines how complex quantum systems use quantum simulators and how features such as hypersensitivity could hinder reliable quantum information processing. Students and faculty across the United States attended the summer course, engaging in the scientific discussions and the lectures.
Poggi first considered physics a career thanks to a high school teacher in Argentina who encouraged him to study the revolutionary theories of relativity and quantum mechanics. Fascinated with quantum theory after reading a book by Einstein, he learned to love math and its connection with physics at the University of Buenos Aires, where he pursued experimental research in an optics lab while finally choosing theoretical research in quantum control.
What excites you about this growing new field?"Quantum physics used to be regarded as a set of bizarre rules that governed the strange behavior of the atomic world. For the past decades, it has been recognized that these rules could be seen as a feature rather than a bug, so that quantum states of superposition may be used to solve computational problems more efficiently. I am particularly excited that there is still a lot to learn about the physics of complex quantum systems, especially out of equilibrium. Quantum devices have a tremendous potential to advance knowledge in this area. The notion of quantum chaos, for example, has taken a new shape in the past few years in the field as researchers started to learn the role of entanglement spreading in many quantum systems and its connection to other system properties such as chaos, ergodicity, and thermalization.
"We live in a unique moment where quantum technologies are being developed with significant pushes from theory and experiment in academic settings, national labs, and industry. As a theorist, it is particularly exciting to think that our studies and inquiries about the fundamental capabilities to manipulate quantum systems could lead to enabling new features in industrial applications - or even to understanding why certain things cannot be done and thus why the focus should be targeted in another direction.
How has QSA supported your research journey?"Being a part of QSA has allowed me to learn about what others are doing and regularly share my work with the community without attending a formal workshop or conference. Many of my collaborators and colleagues here at UNM are part of the QSA, so participating in these collaborative activities is common. It establishes a genuine connection between different groups, potentially leading to more interdisciplinary work.
"Research-wise, we recently finished a QSA project where we studied how a quantum simulator becomes more error-prone in specific types of situations. We discovered that these situations could be explained partly by concepts developed for quantum physics and classical dynamics systems. Making this connection between quantum information and other topics on firm grounds was challenging. It demanded leaving the comfort zone of our expertise to learn about concepts in condensed matter and nonlinear dynamics, so one of the most rewarding aspects of being part of QSA is being able to engage with many colleagues at other institutions and in different ways. QIS is truly an interdisciplinary field, so having done this is a good practice for the future as well."
Goals"I look forward to taking advantage of all the center-wide knowledge and expertise being developed in a variety of topics and collaborating with people from other institutions to keep up to date and get early access to the most recent developments in QIS."
Advice to high-school students"It is exciting to get involved in QIS research because quantum technologies are still in development. There is a lot to do, and the tasks are very diverse. For example, theres research in quantum algorithms and applications of quantum devices, the fundamentals of quantum information processing, and developing the essential tools in the lab to make the quantum devices. Think about what excites you the most and look for mentors to help you get started. But also, dont be afraid to try different things. Its typically hard to find a good match on the first try and you will gain more tools to tackle problems in your future research. QIS is interdisciplinary, so being in touch with specialized communities with diverse expertise will always be a plus."
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Changhao Yi
Changhao YiChanghao Yi is a graduate student and part of the Crosson Research Group at CQuIC.
Yi specializes in quantum algorithms, specifically those for Hamiltonian simulation to study condensed matter physics and materials science.
What excites about this growing new field?"I think we are in a stage when the development of theoretical physics slows down. There are two main reasons. First, the systems are too complicated to solve even if we know all the basic principles; second, experimental physics is not developed enough to discover new phenomena. I believe the construction and control of complex quantum systems can be helpful in both aspects, so it's fascinating to combine the different knowledge areas in theoretical physics, math, and computer science to create something new.
"I look forward to the realization of quantum computing and how the concepts in quantum information, like entanglement and complexity, can be helpful in our understanding of condensed matter physics and high energy physics.
How has QSA supported your research journey?"My experience with QSA has been helpful in my research because I tune in to the QSA science talks frequently. I have also had the chance to meet researchers with similar experiences and interests. This regular communication broadens my horizon and motivates me to progress. The main challenge is learning how to collaborate with other researchers with different backgrounds. For example, I have a physics undergraduate degree. Still, my mentor at UNM has a background in computer science. And I meet researchers at QSA with a diversity of experiences, so sometimes I need to work on projects with many unfamiliar concepts."
Goals"My short-term goal is to continue my research and gain more theoretical and hands-on experience. My long-term goal is to become a professor in the field."
Advice to high-school students"Quantum information science is a research area with vitality. If you are interested in experiments, computer science, math, or theoretical physics, you can find plenty of questions to work on. This community is growing every day. It's the right time to join now."
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Founded in 1931 on the belief that the biggest scientific challenges are best addressed by teams, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and its scientists have been recognized with 14 Nobel Prizes. Today, Berkeley Lab researchers develop sustainable energy and environmental solutions, create useful new materials, advance the frontiers of computing, and probe the mysteries of life, matter, and the universe. Scientists from around the world rely on the Labs facilities for their own discovery science. Berkeley Lab is a multiprogram national laboratory, managed by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energys Office of Science.
DOEs Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time.
For more information, visit Energy.gov.
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Meet QSA's early-career researchers advancing the QIS frontier - UNM Newsroom
Time might not exist, according to physicists and philosophers but thats okay – ABC News
Does time exist? The answer to this question may seem obvious: of course it does! Just look at a calendar or a clock.
But developments in physics suggest the non-existence of time is an open possibility, and one that we should take seriously.
How can that be, and what would it mean? It'll take a little while to explain, but don't worry: even if time doesn't exist, our lives will go on as usual.
Physics is in crisis. For the past century or so, we have explained the universe with two wildly successful physical theories: general relativity and quantum mechanics.
Quantum mechanics describes how things work in the incredibly tiny world of particles and particle interactions.General relativitydescribes the big picture of gravity and how objects move.
Both theories work extremely well in their own right, but the two are thought to conflict with one another. Though the exact nature of the conflict is controversial, scientists generally agree both theories need to be replaced with a new, more general theory.
Physicists want to produce a theory of "quantum gravity" that replaces general relativity and quantum mechanics, while capturing the extraordinary success of both. Such a theory would explain how gravity's big picture works at the miniature scale of particles.
It turns out that producing a theory of quantum gravity is extraordinarily difficult.
One attempt to overcome the conflict between the two theories isstring theory. String theory replaces particles with strings vibrating in as many as 11 dimensions.
However, string theory faces a further difficulty. String theories provide a range of models that describe a universe broadly like our own, and they don't really make any clear predictions that can be tested by experiments to figure out which model is the right one.
In the 1980s and 1990s, many physicists became dissatisfied with string theory and came up with a range of new mathematical approaches to quantum gravity.
One of the most prominent of these isloop quantum gravity, which proposes that the fabric of space and time is made of a network of extremely small discrete chunks, or "loops".
One of the remarkable aspects of loop quantum gravity is that it appears to eliminate time entirely.
Loop quantum gravity is not alone in abolishing time: a number of other approaches also seem to remove time as a fundamental aspect of reality.
So we know we need a new physical theory to explain the universe, and that this theory might not feature time.
Suppose such a theory turns out to be correct. Would it follow that time does not exist?
It's complicated, and it depends what we mean by exist.
Theories of physics don't include any tables, chairs, or people, and yet we still accept that tables, chairs and people exist.
Why? Because we assume that such things exist at a higher level than the level described by physics.
We say that tables, for example, "emerge" from an underlying physics of particles whizzing around the universe.
But while we have a pretty good sense of how a table might be made out of fundamental particles, we have no idea how time might be "made out of" something more fundamental.
So unless we can come up with a good account of howtime emerges, it is not clear we can simply assume time exists.
Time might not exist at any level.
Saying that time does not exist at any level is like saying that there are no tables at all.
Trying to get by in a world without tables might be tough, but managing in a world without time seems positively disastrous.
Our entire lives are built around time. We plan for the future, in light of what we know about the past. We hold people morally accountable for their past actions, with an eye to reprimanding them later on.
We believe ourselves to beagents(entities that cando things) in part because we can plan to act in a way that will bring about changes in the future.
But what's the point of acting to bring about a change in the future when, in a very real sense, there is no future to act for?
What's the point of punishing someone for a past action, when there is no past and so, apparently, no such action?
The discovery that time does not exist would seem to bring the entire world to a grinding halt. We would have no reason to get out of bed.
There is a way out of the mess.
While physics might eliminate time, it seems to leave causationintact: the sense in which one thing can bring about another.
Perhaps what physics is telling us, then, is that causation and not time is the basic feature of our universe.
If that's right, then agency can still survive. For it is possible to reconstruct a sense of agency entirely in causal terms.
At least, that's what Kristie Miller, Jonathan Tallant and I argue inour new book.
We suggest the discovery that time does not exist may have no direct impact on our lives, even while it propels physics into a new era.
Sam Baron isan associate professor atAustralian Catholic University.This piece first appeared on The Conversation.
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Time might not exist, according to physicists and philosophers but thats okay - ABC News
China May Have Just Taken the Lead in the Quantum Computing Race – Defense One
China may have taken the lead in the race to practical quantum computing with a recent announcement that it has shattered a record for solving a complex problem.
In 2019, Googlereported that its 53-qubit Sycamore processor had completed in 3.3 minutes a task that would have taken a traditional supercomputerat least 2.5 days. Last October, Chinas 66-qubit Zuchongzhi 2 quantum processor reportedly completed the same task 1 million times faster. That processor was developed by a team of researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences Center for Excellence in Quantum Information and Quantum Physics, in conjunction with the Shanghai Institute of Technical Physics and the Shanghai Institute of Microsystem and Information Technology.
Traditional supercomputers like those of the U.S. military and the Peoples Liberation Armys 56th Research Institute are used to conduct complex simulations for equipment design, process images and signals to spot targets and points of interest, and analyze oceans of data to understand hidden trends and connections. But some tasks remain time and resource intensive, for even the tiniest computing bits require time to flip between 1 and 0.
Superconducting quantum computers can bypass physical limits by creating a superposition of the 1 and 0 values. Essentially, standard computing bits must be either a 1 or a 0. But in extremely low temperatures, the physical properties of matter undergo significant changes. Superconducting quantum computers take advantage of these changes to create qubits (quantum bits), which are not limited by the processing hurdles that traditional computers face. Qubits can be both 1 or 0, simultaneously.This promises to speed up computing immensely, enabling assaults on henceforth uncrackable problems like decrypting currently unbreakable codes, pushing AI and machine learning to new heights, and designing entirely new materials, chemicals, and medicines.
The worlds scientific and military powers are spending billions of dollars in the race to turn this promise into reality. China has notched several notable advancements in recent years. In 2020, the University of Science and Technology of China, home of leading Chinese quantum computing scholarPan Jianwei, conducted the first space-based quantum communications, using the Micius satellite to create an ultra-secure data link between two ground stations separated by more than 1,000 miles.
In October, a Chinese teamreported that its light-based Jiuzhang 2 processor could complete a task in one millisecond that a conventional computer would require 30 trillion years to finish. This breakthrough marked a new top speed for a quantum processor whose qubits are light-based, not superconducting. The quantum states needed for the superconducting computers to function are delicate, can be unstable, and are prone to causing large numbers of errors. However, light-based supercomputers also have theirdrawbacks, as it is difficult to increase the number of photons in this type of quantum computer, due to their delicate state. It remains to be seen which method will be more prevalent.
These achievements stem from Beijings emphasis on quantum computing research. China is reportedly investing $10 billion in the field, and says it increased national R&D spending by 7 percent last year. By contrast, the U.S. government devoted $1.2 billion to quantum computing research in 2018 under a newnational strategy. Last year, the Senatepassed a bill to create aDirectorate of Technology and Innovation at the National Science Foundation, and add $29 billion for research into quantum computing and artificial intelligence from 2022 to 2026, but it awaits reconciliation with a similar billpassed by the House last month.
Chinese researchers, firms, and agencies now hold morepatents in quantum tech than does the United States (although U.S. companies have more in the specific field of quantum computing), amid allegations that these advancements benefit from stolen U.S. work. A year ago, the Commerce Departmentblacklisted seven supercomputing entities for their association with the Peoples Liberation Army. Further, there is evidence that the Chinese government has been stealing encrypted U.S. government and commercial data, warehousing it against the day when quantum computers can break todays encryption.
We are still a few years away from seeing a real advent of quantum computing. Currently, most quantum computers are able to coherently operate with around50 qubits. To realize quantum computings full potential in codebreaking, for example, would require qubit amounts in thethousands. But progress is being made. IBMreportedly produced a 127-qubit superconducting quantum computer in November,intends to unveil a 400-qubit processor this year, and aims to produce a 1,000-qubit processor in 2023.
Given the enormous strategic potential of quantum computing in a wide variety of fields, this competition is set to only grow more intense in the near future. Whether the U.S. can keep pace remains to be seen.
Thomas Corbett is a research analyst with BluePath Labs. His areas of focus include Chinese foreign relations, emerging technology, and international economics.
P.W. Singer is a strategist at New America and the author of multiple books on technology and security, includingWired for War,Ghost Fleet,Burn-In, andLikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media.
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China May Have Just Taken the Lead in the Quantum Computing Race - Defense One
Product commercialisation and strong govt-industry-academia collaboration needed for Indias progress on Quantum Tech – The Financial Express
By Tushar Gandhi
The term, Quantum Technology (QT), has become immensely popular and is oft-used beyond doubt. A simple search on Googles News section yielded about 75,00,000 results; the top news being Google and Amazon scheduled to attend a White House forum on Quantum Technology.
Now, before we get into the whys of QT, let us take a step back to understand its origins. QT is based on Quantum theory, which is the theoretical basis of modern physics that explains the nature and behaviour of matter and energy at atomic and subatomic levels. Interestingly, the concept of atoms is more than 2,000 years old and we owe it to ancient Greek philosophers, who introduced it. Atom means one that is uncuttable.
The 19th century saw the formulation of hypotheses about subatomic structure and finally in the initial years of the 20th century, scientists including Max Planck and Albert Einstein immensely contributed to our understanding of Quantum theory. The etymology of the term, Quantum, is itself fascinating; it is derived from Latin, meaning how great or how much.
Indeed, the potential of Quantum Technology is limitless. Countries and companies are investing billions of dollars in research and development, and building quantum communication networks to secure their cyberspace especially in the areas of sovereignty and defence. Quantum computing is an important application of QT. Quantum computers fundamentally process information differently than classical computers. Instead of using transistors that can only represent either the 1 or the 0 of binary information at a single time, quantum computers use qubits that can represent both 0 and 1 simultaneously. Since the system operates beyond regular logic, reason and predictability, its randomness of possibilities give access to an exponentially larger computational space.
QT can be used in the areas of computing, supply chain logistics, cryptography, sensing, biology, meteorology, cyber security, artificial intelligence, telecom, banking, internet-of-things, defence, and healthcare. In short, QT is tipped to come up in a big way in our everyday lives in the course of the next 10 years.
This is why according to Gartner, almost 90 percent organisations will be active in quantum computing projects and will utilise quantum computing as a service by 2023. The overall quantum market is forecast to reach $240 million by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 48 percent.
Technology giants such as Google, IBM, Amazon, Toshiba and Microsoft have invested heavily in QT. Google recently achieved quantum supremacy by solving a problem in 200 seconds that would take a classical computer 10,000 years! IBM, in June 2021, launched IBM Quantum System One in Germany, the most powerful quantum computer in Europe. IBM has a network of 150 organizations, including research labs, start-ups, universities and enterprises that are able to access its quantum computers via the cloud.
Governments across the world, including the U.S., UK, Germany, Japan and China, are showing immense interest and progress in QTs future potential. For instance, China established a 4,600 kilometers quantum communications network across the country and is also switching its key defence, banking and financial transactions on quantum communications network. In the U.S., QT is one of Pentagons top modernization priorities which has potential to be leveraged for a variety of military applications. These countries are also providing fiscal and skill-based support, and are partnering with private organizations to build their quantum technology infrastructures.
India too is taking steps towards adopting QT. In the Union Budget 2020, India allocated over $1 billion, over five years, towards the National Mission on Quantum Technology and Applications (NMQTA). Areas of focus include fundamental science, technology development, human and infrastructural resource generation, innovation and start-ups to address issues concerning national priorities.
Separately, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) plans to build a national quantum communication network in collaboration with Department of Telecommunications. The Department of Science and Technology, which is overseeing disbursement of the allocated $1 billion fund, has identified government institutions to work along with the private sector on areas such as product development, R&D and skills development.
India has, so far, achieved approximately 100 kilometers of quantum network, lagging far behind other countries that have managed to develop thousands of kilometers of quantum network. To quickly progress, India will need to focus on product development and commercialisation, in addition to new, more intensive and sustained R&D efforts. Its impetus on indigenous manufacturing of semiconductors will also go a long way, as these are critical and essential components for development and commercialisation of quantum technologies.
Most countries that have achieved significant progress in quantum have one thing in common strong collaboration among the government, industry and academia. India, too, will need to have these three elements work closely on specific programmes and projects to develop indigenous or Made-in-India QT and networks to make its mark on the global map.
The author is the CEO and Shreya Kamath is the Researcher at public policy firm Gateway Consulting. Views are personal and not necessarily that of FinancialExpress.com)
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Tewksbury alums win Goldwater Award | News | homenewshere.com – Woburn Daily Times
TEWKSBURY The Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education foundation provides scholarships to college sophomores and juniors who intend to pursue research careers in natural sciences, mathematics and engineering. This nationally prestigious award was bestowed upon two women with Tewksbury roots this year: Cora Barrett and Carolyn Curley.
Barrett, a 2019 graduate of Northfield Mount Hermon School in Gill, Massachusetts is a Tewksbury resident. Barrett is a junior at Wellesley College, double majoring in Physics and Mathematics while also a member of the crew team.
Curley, 2019 graduate of Tewksbury Memorial High School, is a junior at the University of New England in Maine. Curley is a biochemistry major and is a forward on the UNE hockey team.
Barret is also a womens hockey player and she and Curley played together briefly in Tewksbury when they were younger. Curley is involved in research to develop novel antibiotic compounds to combat drug resistant bacterial infections. Barrett is involved investigating how to improve the calibration speed for quantum computers and building exponentially more powerful computers.
Barrets current research is the Engineering Quantum Systems Group at MIT investigating how to use quantum effects like superposition and entanglement to build faster computers. Barrett loves the weirdness of quantum mechanics and studies physics to gain an understanding for how the universe functions on the smallest scale.
Curley is working on the discovery of novel, safe and effective drug candidates to treat drug resistant bacteria by examining polyphenols in algae and creating synthetic approaches to assess toxicity and efficacy.
I am excited about the medicinal chemistry research because it is multi-disciplinary, occurring at the interface of chemistry and the biological sciences with potential applications to medicine, said Curley.
Both women are involved in additional pursuits at their universities and have been recognized for their efforts as pertains to their research. Barrett and Curley have authored papers, presented at symposia and conferences, and are members of associations and societies representing their respective fields.
The Goldwater award was created to encourage outstanding students to pursue research careers in mathematics, the natural sciences, or engineering and to foster excellence in those fields.
This year, the foundation awarded 417 students with scholarships out of an estimated pool of over 5,000 college sophomores and juniors from 433 academic institutions.
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Tewksbury alums win Goldwater Award | News | homenewshere.com - Woburn Daily Times