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Category: quantum physics

The realization of so-called topological materials—which exhibit exotic, defect-resistant properties and are expected to have applications in electronics, optics, quantum computing, and other fields—has opened up a new realm in materials discovery.

Several of the hotly studied topological materials to date are known as . Their surfaces are expected to conduct electricity with very little resistance, somewhat akin to superconductors but without the need for incredibly chilly temperatures, while their interiors—the so-called “bulk” of the material—do not conduct current.

Now, a team of researchers working at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has discovered the strongest topological conductor yet, in the form of thin crystal samples that have a spiral-staircase structure. The team’s study of crystals, dubbed topological chiral crystals, is reported in the March 20 edition of the journal Nature.

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In quantum physics, particles can ’tunnel’ through seemingly impenetrable barriers, even when they apparently don’t have the energy to do so. Now, researchers have gleaned behind the curtain to better understand how this trick is done.

This problem has puzzled scientists for decades – in particular, the time it takes for particles to do their quantum tunnelling, and get from one side of a barrier to another.

In the case of the atomic hydrogen particles used in these experiments, the researchers found that it happens instantaneously.

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For the first time, one of the top prizes in mathematics has been given to a woman.

On Tuesday, the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announced it has awarded this year’s Abel Prize — an award modeled on the Nobel Prizes — to Karen Uhlenbeck, an emeritus professor at the University of Texas at Austin. The award cites “the fundamental impact of her work on analysis, geometry and mathematical physics.”

One of Dr. Uhlenbeck’s advances in essence described the complex shapes of soap films not in a bubble bath but in abstract, high-dimensional curved spaces. In later work, she helped put a rigorous mathematical underpinning to techniques widely used by physicists in quantum field theory to describe fundamental interactions between particles and forces.

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Researchers from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology teamed up with colleagues from the U.S. and Switzerland and returned the state of a quantum computer a fraction of a second into the past. They also calculated the probability that an electron in empty interstellar space will spontaneously travel back into its recent past. The study is published in Scientific Reports.

“This is one in a series of papers on the possibility of violating the . That law is closely related to the notion of the arrow of time that posits the one-way direction of time from the past to the future,” said the study’s lead author Gordey Lesovik, who heads the Laboratory of the Physics of Quantum Information Technology at MIPT.

“We began by describing a so-called local perpetual motion machine of the second kind. Then, in December, we published a paper that discusses the violation of the second law via a device called a Maxwell’s demon,” Lesovik said. “The most recent paper approaches the same problem from a third angle: We have artificially created a state that evolves in a direction opposite to that of the thermodynamic arrow of time.”

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Time: it’s constantly running out and we never have enough of it. Some say it’s an illusion, some say it flies like an arrow. Well, this arrow of time is a big headache in physics. Why does time have a particular direction? And can such a direction be reversed?

A new study, published in Scientific Reports, is providing an important point of discussion on the subject. An international team of researchers has constructed a time-reversal program on a quantum computer, in an experiment that has huge implications for our understanding of quantum computing. Their approach also revealed something rather important: the time-reversal operation is so complex that it is extremely improbable, maybe impossible, for it to happen spontaneously in nature.

As far as laws of physics go, in many cases, there’s nothing to stop us going forward and backward in time. In certain quantum systems it is possible to create a time-reversal operation. Here, the team crafted a thought experiment based on a realistic scenario.

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A team of researchers from the University of St Andrews (St Andrews, Scotland) has achieved a breakthrough in the measurement of lasers that they say could revolutionize the future of fiber-optic communications. They also say the wavelength meter (or wavemeter) will boost optical and quantum sensing technology, enhance the performance of next-generation sensors, and expand the information-carrying capacity of fiber-optic networks.

A team of researchers from the University of St Andrews has achieved a breakthrough in the measurement of lasers which could revolutionise the future of fiber-optic communications.

The new research, published in Optics Letters (Wednesday 6 March), reveals the team of scientists has developed a low-cost and highly-sensitive device capable of measuring the wavelength of light with unprecedented accuracy.

The wavemeter development will boost optical and quantum sensing technology, enhancing the performance of next generation sensors and the information-carrying capacity of fiber-optic communications networks.

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A new quantum physics experiment just lent evidence to a mind-boggling idea that was previously limited to the realm of theory, according to the MIT Technology Review — that under the right conditions, two people can observe the same event, see two different things happen, and both be correct.

According to research shared to the preprint server arXiv on Tuesday, physicists from Heriot-Watt University demonstrated for the first time how two people can experience different realities by recreating a classic quantum physics thought experiment.

The experiment involves two people observing a single photon, the smallest quantifiable unit of light that can act as either a particle or a wave under different conditions.

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