Lifeboat Foundation

Currently, computing technologies are rapidly evolving and reshaping how we imagine the future. Quantum computing is taking its first toddling steps toward delivering practical results that promise unprecedented abilities. Meanwhile, artificial intelligence remains in public conversation as it’s used for everything from writing business emails to generating bespoke images or songs from text prompts to producing deep fakes.

Some physicists are exploring the opportunities that arise when the power of machine learning — a widely used approach in AI research—is brought to bear on quantum physics. Machine learning may accelerate quantum research and provide insights into quantum technologies, and quantum phenomena present formidable challenges that researchers can use to test the bounds of machine learning.

When studying quantum physics or its applications (including the development of quantum computers), researchers often rely on a detailed description of many interacting quantum particles. But the very features that make quantum computing potentially powerful also make quantum systems difficult to describe using current computers. In some instances, machine learning has produced descriptions that capture the most significant features of quantum systems while ignoring less relevant details—efficiently providing useful approximations.

As opposed to black holes, white holes are thought to eject matter and light while never absorbing any. Detecting these as yet hypothetical objects could not only provide evidence of quantum gravity but also explain the origin of dark matter.

No one today questions the existence of black holes, objects from which nothing, not even light, can escape. But after they were first predicted in 1915 by Einstein’s general theory of relativity, it took many decades and multiple observations to show that they actually existed. And when it comes to white holes, history may well repeat itself. Such objects, which are also predicted by general relativity, can only eject matter and light, and as such are the exact opposite of black holes, which can only absorb them. So, just as it is impossible to escape from a black hole, it is equally impossible to enter a white one, occasionally and perhaps more aptly dubbed a “white fountain”. For many, these exotic bodies are mere mathematical curiosities.

It seems like over the past few years, Quantum is being talked about more and more. We’re hearing words like qubits, entanglement, super position, and quantum computing. But what does that mean … and is quantum science really that big of a deal? Yeah, it is.

It’s because Quantum science has the potential to revolutionize our world. From processing data to predicting weather, to picking stocks or even discovering new medical drugs. Quantum, specifically quantum computers, could solve countless problems.

Continue reading “Unlocking the Power of Quantum Computing” »

In an interview Dr Stephanie Simmons, Chief Quantum Officer of Photonic, explains the need to scale quantum computers and their approach to tackling this challenge to pave the way for reliable, large-scale quantum computing.

For quantum computers to move from laboratory to commercialization, these devices will need to scale to millions of qubits.

Scaling quantum computers is critical to unlocking exponential speed-ups to help solve some of the world’s biggest problems and unlock its greatest opportunities, said Stephanie Simmons, CQO of Photonic, a company focused on using its photonically linked spin qubits in silicon to build a scalable, fault-tolerant and distributed quantum system.

Calcium oxide is a cheap, chalky chemical compound commonly used in the manufacturing of cement, plaster, paper, and steel. But the material may soon have a more high-tech application.

UChicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering researchers and their collaborator in Sweden have used theoretical and computational approaches to discover how tiny, lone atoms of bismuth embedded within solid calcium oxide can act as qubits — the building blocks of quantum computers and quantum communication devices.

These qubits are described in Nature Communications (“Discovery of atomic clock-like spin defects in simple oxides from first principles”).

“… living systems evolve to exploit any aspect of physics that enables exploration of all possible ‘fitness landscapes’.”

Indeed!

In 1990, within the intellectual haven of Haverford College, I embarked on a transformative academic journey into biophysics – the captivating intersection of physics and biology.

Continue reading “This bold new theory of ‘quantum weirdness’ could rewrite the story of evolution” »

Researchers at Harvard University, Sabanci University, and Peking University recently gathered findings that could shed light on the origin of the high-temperature absorption peaks observed in strange metals, a class of materials exhibiting unusual electronic properties that do not conform to the conventional theory of metals.

In a development at the intersection of quantum mechanics and general relativity, researchers have made significant strides toward unraveling the mysteries of quantum gravity. This work sheds new light on future experiments that hold promise for resolving one of the most fundamental enigmas in modern physics: the reconciliation of Einstein’s theory of gravity with the principles of quantum mechanics.

Researchers in China have demonstrated how entanglement might potentially power future generations of computers, according to a story in the South China Morning Post. This advance, achieved by scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Innovation Academy of Precision Measurement Science and Technology, points toward how quantum engines can use their own entangled states as a form of fuel.

Entanglement is a quantum phenomenon where a pair of separated photons seem to be intimately linked, regardless of the distance between them. Scientists have long theorized that this characteristic, once robustly managed, could hold vast potential for quantum computing, and this study adds further evidence to its viability in practical applications, the researchers suggest.

“Our study’s highlight is the first experimental realization of a quantum engine with entangled characteristics. [It] quantitatively verified that entanglement can serve as a type of ‘fuel’,” said Zhou Fei, one of the corresponding authors, as reported in the SCMP.