Quantum Day

Showing posts with label 21st Century. Show all posts

12 December 2011

Multi-purpose Photonic Chip Developed for Quantum Computers

Scientists have developed a reconfigurable quantum photonic chip, control electronics, and optical fibers which send photons into and out of the chip. This is a big step towards the development of the quantum computer.

Scientists and engineers are looking at quantum computers as the next replacement to digital and silicon based computing. Basically, it's the next evolution in computing.

A Quantum computer does not use bits to store information. It uses quantum bits or qubits. A qubit is basically an atom that carries the information just like a bit does. But unlike a bit, it just doesn't hold a 1 or 0 state. In an atom, it can have a spin-up stage (1) or a spin-down stage (0). But aside from that, an atom can be in both stages at the same time. This peculiar property of the atom is what everyone is excited about. This enables quantum computers to perform complex calculations and simulations that can not be performed by today’s computers. (A basic explanation on what a Quantum computer is can be found here.)

Scientists are looking at entanglement as the basic resource in connecting and transmitting information from one atom to the other. Entanglement is the connection between two particles. Basically, when two particles interact physically and are separated, the pair still are able to interact with each other regardless of distance. Einstein famously called this property 'spooky action at a distance'.

Video: What is Quantum Entanglement?

Researchers at Bristol University have recreated this on a tiny silicon chip. The chip can generate, manipulate and measure this phenomenon. They have also used the same chip to measure mixture—an often unwanted effect from the environment, but a phenomenon which can now be controlled and used to characterize quantum circuits, as well as being of fundamental interest to physicists.

"In order to build a quantum computer, we not only need to be able to control complex phenomena such as entanglement and mixture, but we need to be able to do this on a chip, so that we can scalably and practically duplicate many such miniature circuits—in much the same way as the modern computers we have today," says Professor Jeremy O'Brien, Director of the Centre for Quantum Photonics. "Our device enables this and we believe it is a major step forward towards optical quantum computing."

The 70mm by 3mm chip (the black rectangle in center of image) consists of a network of tiny channels which guide, manipulate and interact single photons—particles of light. These photons acts as the qubits for the quantum computer. Using eight reconfigurable electrodes embedded in the circuit, photon pairs can be manipulated and entangled, producing any possible entangled state of two photons or any mixed state of one photon.

"It isn't ideal if your quantum computer can only perform a single specific task", explains Peter Shadbolt, lead author of the study, which is published in the journal Nature Photonics. "We would prefer to have a reconfigurable device which can perform a broad variety of tasks, much like our desktop PCs today—this reconfigurable ability is what we have now demonstrated. This device is approximately ten times more complex than previous experiments using this technology. It's exciting because we can perform many different experiments in a very straightforward way, using a single reconfigurable chip."

The researchers, who have been developing quantum photonic chips for the past six years, are now working on scaling up the complexity of this device, and see this technology as the building block for the quantum computers of the future.

Video: Dr. Dominic Walliman explains Quantum Computers

Dr Terry Rudolph from Imperial College in London, UK, believes this work is a significant advance. He said: "Being able to generate, manipulate and measure entanglement on a chip is an awesome achievement. Not only is it a key step towards the many quantum technologies— such as optical quantum computing—which are going to revolutionize our lives, it gives us much more opportunity to explore and play with some of the very weird quantum phenomena we still struggle to wrap our minds around. They have made it so easy to dial up in seconds an experiment that used to take us months, that I'm wondering if even I can run my own experiment now!"

29 November 2011

Digital Contact Lens for Heads Up Display and Augmented Reality

Movies and computer games have long used the Heads Up Display (HUD). Usually in movies, these are used to depict futuristic weapon systems or devices. Movies like Terminator, Iron Man and even the old Robocop movies have shown the HUD.

In computer games, those information on the screen help the player know what is going on during the game.

A head-up display or heads-up display (HUD) is any transparent display that presents data without requiring users to look away from their usual viewpoints. In real life applications, most would recognize the HUD from videos of jet fighters. Those are the things the pilot sees superimposed to his helmet visor or screen.

They were initially developed for use in assisting pilots flying military aircraft and other military applications. Now, HUDs can be seen used in commercial aircraft, automobiles, and other applications.

Researchers from the University of Washington, Seattle, and Aalto University in Finland constructed a device that could one day lead to this kind of technology without the use of heavy bulky devices. They constructed a computerized single-pixel contact lens.

Babak Parviz is from the University of Washington and the lead researcher of the study.

Video: An imagining of how HUD can seamlessly integrate into our daily lives.

Parviz says, "Our group has expertise in miniaturization and integration of devices into unconventional substrates. The contact lens is a perfect platform for this. We also wanted to explore if it is possible to have a single personal display instead of numerous devices with numerous displays per person,"

The lens display consists of an antenna to gather power from an external source, an integrated circuit to store this energy, and a transparent sapphire chip containing a single blue LED. According to Parviz, this device does not affect the function as a normal contact lens in any way. It feels like a normal contact lens.

The device could overlay computer data onto what the person is seeing, making it easy to access information instantly from platforms such as laptops, computers, and mobile phones. It could also be linked to a person's body monitor or biosensor gather information and alert the wearer to any changes in his body.

At the moment, the device is in its early stages. The researchers are looking into making improvements that will allow a fully functional, remotely powered, high-resolution display on the lens. They also need to resolve the display of text characters on the display.

Parviz explains, "We still need to perfect the focusing mechanism further before we can do this if the text is arbitrary. Pre-determined text is a lot easier..."

Parviz and team are not the only ones looking into this technology. Electrical Engineering students from the University of Massachusetts Amherst are also developing a Personal Head-Up Display. One such design is a HUD in skiing goggles.

13 November 2011

What Is The Higgs Boson And Why It Matters

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CERN Announces Discovery of Higgs Boson
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For the past couple of years, scientists have been trying to discover the Higgs Boson. But what is it? For a really simple explanation, Stephen Colbert, Justin Bieber, and Professor Peter Higgs himself will help explain it here.

Basically, the Higgs boson is theorized to be the particle that determines the mass of an object. More than the Higgs particle (a boson is a class of particles), it is the Higgs field that is important. The Higgs boson is the particle that comprises the field, much like how photons comprise the electromagnetic field.

By discovering the Higgs Boson, scientist may then understand how mass is obtained and why some elements have more mass than others.

Mass can be defined as a quantitive measure of the resistance an object has to change in its velocity. Unlike weight, mass is not affected by gravity. An object has no weight in space but still has mass.

Video: Stephen Colbert and Physicist Brian Cox talking about the Higgs Boson. Highly recommended.

Imagine two people walking at the same pace and same direction in a mall, one is an unknown person and the other is Justin Bieber. Once the two stop walking, more people will flock around Justin Bieber than the other person. Once they start to move again, Bieber would have a hard time gaining momentum to move again because of the people surrounding him. The other, with no one hindering his movement, can easily resume his pace. Bieber has more mass thus slowing him down when trying to accelerate.

This group or clustering effect is called the Higgs mechanism, as postulated by British physicist Peter Higgs. The group of people surrounding Justin basically is a "Higgs field". Each person in that group is the "Higgs boson".

Basically, what Peter Higgs is proposing is that there is a field (Higgs field) that are attracted to objects thus slowing them down, giving them mass. The more particles (Higgs Boson) of the field that object attracts, the more mass it has. Furthermore, as the mass of an object approaches zero, the closer it gets to accelerating to the speed of light. This can be seen with light, since light has no mass and travels at that speed.

Video: Dr. Don Lincoln of Fermilab explains the Higgs Boson

Roger Cashmore Department of Physics of the University of Oxford, UK says, "We know from quantum theory that fields have particles associated with them, the particle for the electromagnetic field being the photon. So there must be a particle associated with the Higg's field, and this is the Higgs boson. Finding the Higgs boson is thus the key to discovering whether the Higgs field does exist and whether our best hypothesis for the origin of mass is indeed correct."

It should be noted that there are theories that does not include the Higgs field and are also equally important. So finding the Higgs field or proving that it does not exist then were both equally important in the field of science.

As Mary and Ian Butterworth of Imperial College London, and Doris and Vigdor Teplitz of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas state, "If particles get their masses from interacting with the empty space Higgs field, then the Higgs particle must exist; but we can't be certain without finding the Higgs. We have other hints about the Higgs; for example, if it exists, it plays a role in "unifying" different forces. However, we believe that nature could contrive to get the results that would flow from the Higgs in other ways. In fact, proving the Higgs particle does not exist would be scientifically every bit as valuable as proving it does."

Although the discovery of the Higgs particle was announced in 2012 by CERN, scientists were still not sure whether the particle they found was actually the Higgs. It was in March 2013 when the findings were verified and CERN released this statement, "CMS and ATLAS have compared a number of options for the spin-parity of this particle, and these all prefer no spin and positive parity [two fundamental criteria of a Higgs boson consistent with the Standard Model]. This, coupled with the measured interactions of the new particle with other particles, strongly indicates that it is a Higgs boson."

Video: Professor Peter Higgs talk about his life work and the Higgs Boson

03 November 2011

Famous Scientists of the 21st Century

The 21st Century is just beginning but science and technology are moving in blazing speeds. Without the scientists, how could we move? Today, we look at a few of the famous and popular scientists of the 21st century.

Who are the movers and shakers of this time? Let's look at a sneak preview of the pioneers and explorers of science in the 21st Century. Some may not sound familiar, others may not show concrete discoveries but these people have brought science to the forefront either by their research or by their advocacy of promoting and spreading scientific knowledge to anyone and everyone. Note: They are listed in no particular order.

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Andre Konstantin Geim, born 21 October 1958 with Dutch, Russian, and British heritage. A physicist working at the University of Manchester, Geim was awarded Nobel Prize in Physics together with Konstantin Novoselov for his work on graphene in 2010.

Graphene is a super-conductive form of carbon, made from single-atom-thick sheets. Graphene consists of one-atom-thick layers of carbon atoms arranged in a two-dimensional hexagon. It is the thinnest material in the world, as well as one of the strongest and hardest and is considered a superior alternative to silicon. And has many other uses.

He also researched diamagnetic levitation and in a famous 1997 experiment, he managed to levitate a frog. He has also done research on mesoscopic physics and superconductivity. About his broad range of science that he studies, Geim says, "Many people chose a subject for their PhD and then continue the same subject until they retire. I despise this approach. I have changed my subject five times before I got my first tenured position and that helped me to learn different subjects."

Here is a short video of Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov explaining about graphene:

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Konstantin Sergeevich Novoselov, born 23 August 1974. He is a Russian=British physicist at the University of Manchester as a Royal Society University Research Fellow. He is known for working together with Andree Geim in discovering and studying graphene. Because of their work, they won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2010.Novoselov is also a recipient of an ERC Starting Grant from the European Research Council.

Dr. Novoselov's record includes 49 papers mostly in Physics and Materials Science and has also been cited 3,536 times in a span of twenty years. Dr. Novoselov is a Royal Society Research Fellow in School of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Manchester as well as the Langworthy Professor and director of the Manchester Centre for Mesoscience and Nanotechnology also at the University of Manchester.

He received a Diploma from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, and undertook his Ph.D. studies at the University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands before moving to the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom with his doctoral advisor Andre Geim in 2001. According to the ISI Essential Science Indicator, his two papers in Science 2004 and Nature 2005 are the most cited papers on graphene and “have opened up a fast moving front”. The paper in Science 2004 is also acknowledged as “one of the most cited recent papers in the field of Physics”.

Here is an interview where Konstantin Novoselov discusses his research on graphene.

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John Craig Venter was born onborn 14 October 14 1946. He is an American biologist famous for being one of the first to sequence the human genome. He also created the first cell with a synthetic genome last 2010. He now works for the J. Craig Venter Institute which he founded. His current work is focused on creating synthetic biological organisms and also documenting the genetic diversity in the world's oceans. He is listed on Time magazine's 2007 and 2008 issue as part of the Time 100 list of the most influential people in the world.

The Global Ocean Sampling Expedition (GOS) is an ocean exploration genome project that will assess the genetic diversity in marine microbial life. It is to understand how the diversity contributes to nature's basic processes. The GOS circumnavigated the globe which started in 2004 and ended 2006.

In May 2010, Venter and his team successfully created what they called "synthetic life". They synthesized a very long DNA molecule containing an entire bacterium genome, and introduced this into another cell. This could lead to producing bacteria that can be engineered to perform specific purpose such as create fuel, manufacture medicine, and correct environmental problems like global warming.

Here is a video of Craig Venter and his team announcing that they've created the first fully functioning, reproducing cell controlled by synthetic DNA. He also explains how they did it and why the achievement is a milestone for science:

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Stephen William Hawking was born 8 January 1942. He is an English theoretical physicist and cosmologist. His scientific books (specially his runaway bestseller, Brief History of Time) and public appearances have made him a popular pop-icon and academic celebrity. In 2009, Hawking was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States.

He is known for his research and contributions to the science of cosmology and quantum gravity. He has also achieved success with works of popular science in which he discusses his own theories and cosmology in general. His contributions to science still keep coming in. Together with Roger Penrose, he provided theorems regarding gravitational singularities within the framework of general relativity. He also gave theoretical predictions about black holes emits radiation. This type of radiation is known as the Hawking radiation or the Bekenstein-Hawking radiation.

Currently, he is the Director of Research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge as well as a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge and a Distinguished Research Chair at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario.

Here is Stephen Hawking discussing and asking questions about the Universe:

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Neil deGrasse Tyson was born on 5 October 1958. He is an American astrophysicist. As stated in his website, He " was born and raised in New York City where he was educated in the public schools clear through his graduation from the Bronx High School of Science. Tyson went on to earn his BA in Physics from Harvard and his PhD in Astrophysics from Columbia.".

He is the Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space, and also a Research Associate in the Department of Astrophysics at the American Museum of Natural History. He is part of this list because of his contribution bringing astrophysics and astronomy to the public. He has hosted the educational science television show NOVA scienceNOW on PBS and has been a guest on several TV shows such as The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and Jeopardy!. It was announced that Tyson will be hosting a new sequel to Carl Sagan's Cosmos: A Personal Voyage TV series. He has made astronomy an interesting subject to people worldwide.

Here is Neil DeGrasse Tyson describing the hypothetical experience of death by falling into a black hole:

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Michio Kaku was born on 24 January 1947. He is an American theoretical physicist. A Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics in the City College of New York of City University of New York, he is also the co-founder of string field theory. Another science communicator like Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Michio Kaku has written several books about physics and related topics. He has also made guest appearances on radio, television, and film.

Kaku achieved popularity because of his knowledge and easy approach to explaining complicated science subjects such as time travel and singularities. Although a theoretical physicist, he covers a wide range of subjects such as wormholes and time travel. He considered the theory that the universe was created from nothing as discussed in the TV show, "What Happened Before the Big Bang".

There are more scientists out there who have contributed to our society. These are just a few of them. We're still at the dawn of this new century. But our science have moved leaps and strides faster than the previous one.

Here is Michio Kaku talks about the Singularity:

Can't wait to see what tomorrow will bring.