A transformative experiment is yielding fresh insights 40 years after the effect’s discovery — and energizing transdisciplinary collaborations.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) has announced a plan to make a quantum internet it says is virtually unhackable. This is definitely a long-term plan that will require new kinds of engineering and technology, not something that will be implemented next year. Let’s take a look at the concept, the plan the DoE has laid out, and how long it all might take.
Within the framework of quantum mechanics, the network proposed here is pretty intuitive. (That’s a big caveat, though!) The report begins with a surprising notion: Although headlines and research have focused on the power of quantum computing, we’re far away from any practical and recognizable computer powered by quantum phenomena. The idea of a quantum network, the DoE says, is far closer to our reach.
🤯 You like quantum. We like quantum. Let’s nerd out together.
Discovery by scientists at Berkeley Lab, UC Berkeley could help find silicon’s successor in race against Moore’s Law.
In the search for new materials with the potential to outperform silicon, scientists have wanted to take advantage of the unusual electronic properties of 2D devices called oxide heterostructures, which consist of atomically thin layers of materials containing oxygen.
Scientists have long known that oxide materials, on their own, are typically insulating – which means that they are not electrically conductive. When two oxide materials are layered together to form a heterostructure, new electronic properties such as superconductivity – the state in which a material can conduct electricity without resistance, typically at hundreds of degrees below freezing – and magnetism somehow form at their interface, which is the juncture where two materials meet. But very little is known about how to control these electronic states because few techniques can probe below the interface.
US officials and scientists have begun laying the groundwork for a more secure “virtually unhackable” internet based on quantum computing technology.
At a presentation Thursday, Department of Energy (DOE) officials issued a report that lays out a blueprint strategy for the development of a national quantum internet, using laws of quantum mechanics to transmit information more securely than on existing networks.
The agency is working with universities and industry researchers on the engineering for the initiative with the aim of creating a prototype within a decade.
“Strange metals” have that name for a reason – these materials exhibit some unusual conductive properties and surprisingly, even have things in common with black holes. Now, a new study has characterized them in more detail, and found that strange metals constitute a new state of matter.
So-called strange metals differ from regular metals because their electrical resistance is directly linked to temperature. Electrons in strange metals are seen to lose their energy as fast as the laws of quantum mechanics allow. But that’s not all – their conductivity is also linked to two fundamental constants of physics: Planck’s constant, which defines how much energy a photon can carry, and Boltzmann’s constant, which relates the kinetic energy of particles in a gas with the temperature of that gas.
While these properties have been well observed over the years, scientists have had a hard time accurately modeling strange metals. So in a new study, researchers from the Flatiron Institute and Cornell University set out to solve the model, right down to absolute zero – lower than the lowest possible temperature for materials.
“Not only does God play dice but… he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen,” said Stephen Hawking about the paradoxical physics of black Holes. Welcome to the bizarre quantum world of “strange metals” –a new state of matter.
“The fact that we call them strange metals should tell you how well we understand them. Strange metals share remarkable properties with black holes, opening exciting new directions for theoretical physics,” says Olivier Parcollet, a senior research scientist at the Flatiron Institute’s Center for Computational Quantum Physics (CCQ), about the quantum world of metals that dissipate energy as fast as they’re allowed to under the laws of quantum mechanics. The electrical resistivity of a strange metal, unlike that of ordinary metals, is proportional to the temperature.
Even by the standards of quantum physicists, reports the Flatiron Institute, strange metals are just plain odd. Generating a theoretical understanding of strange metals is one of the biggest challenges in condensed matter physics. Now, using cutting-edge computational techniques, researchers from the Flatiron Institute and Cornell University have solved the first robust theoretical model of strange metals. The work reveals that strange metals are a new state of matter, the researchers report July 22 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
US officials and scientists have begun laying the groundwork for a more secure “virtually unhackable” internet based on quantum computing technology.
At a presentation Thursday, Department of Energy (DOE) officials issued a report that lays out a blueprint strategy for the development of a national quantum internet, using laws of quantum mechanics to transmit information more securely than on existing networks.
The agency is working with universities and industry researchers on the engineering for the initiative with the aim of creating a prototype within a decade.
Extreme Conditions
A metal’s electrical resistance, or how much it impedes the flow of electricity, is determined by a number of factors. But, according to the new research, if a superconducting metal — one that doesn’t impede electrical currents at all — is heated past the temperature at which it can still superconduct, it becomes a strange metal. At that point, its resistance is determined only by temperature and two fundamental constants — the same three factors that determine many qualities of a black hole.
“The fact that we call them strange metals should tell you how well we understand them,” Olivier Parcollet from the Flatiron Institute’s Center for Computational Quantum Physics said in a press release. “Strange metals share remarkable properties with black holes, opening exciting new directions for theoretical physics.”
Physicists at the University of Alberta have developed technology that can translate data from microwaves to optical light—an advance that has promising applications in the next generation of super-fast quantum computers and secure fiber-optic telecommunications.
“Many quantum computer technologies work in the microwave regime, while many quantum communications channels, such as fiber and satellite, work with optical light,” explained Lindsay LeBlanc, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Ultracold Gasses for Quantum Simulation. “We hope that this platform can be used in the future to transduce quantum signals between these two regimes.”
The new technology works by introducing a strong interaction between microwave radiation and atomic gas. The microwaves are then modulated with an audio signal, encoding information into the microwave. This modulation is passed through the gas atoms, which are then probed with optical light to encode the signal into the light.
