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Category: quantum physics – Page 2

Electron–atom scattering encodes the quantum state of electron wave packets

A new analysis reveals what happens when very short or narrow electron beams encounter a particle. The research is published in the New Journal of Physics. Scientists should be able to achieve a new level of control over high-energy electrons interacting with a particle, according to the theoretical analysis by a RIKEN physicist and two colleagues.

Electrons are particles, but according to quantum mechanics they also behave like waves under certain circumstances.

Electron microscopes exploit this wave-like nature of electrons to obtain high-resolution images of objects by imaging how an electron beam is scattered from an object.

Giant Atoms for Measuring Radiation

The invention of the radio just over a century ago transformed people’s ability to communicate. Suddenly, people could send and receive light-speed messages from thousands of miles away — a capability that continues to transform the world.

Soon, quantum scientists could usher in the next big advance in radio communication: compact, highly sensitive receivers based on atoms.

Atoms are typically far too small to interact with radio waves. But one of quantum theory’s stranger predictions is the possibility of gargantuan atoms with diameters up to the width of a human hair.

How a century-long argument over light’s true nature came to an end

Two of the forefathers of quantum theory, Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr, had a famous argument over whether light is a wave or a particle. Columnist Karmela Padavic-Callaghan finds that the matter has been settled once and for all.

By Karmela Padavic-Callaghan

Quantum computing without interruptions

Mid-circuit measurements are one of the biggest practical hurdles in quantum error correction on encoded qubits. Researchers in Innsbruck and Aachen have now proposed and experimentally demonstrated that a universal fault-tolerant quantum algorithm can be executed without such measurements. Using a trapped-ion quantum processor, the team successfully ran Grover’s quantum search algorithm on three logical qubits.

A key bottleneck in today’s leading approaches to quantum error correction is the need to repeatedly pause and measure the quantum processor mid-computation, a process that is slow, technically demanding, and itself a significant source of errors.

Now, a joint team from the University of Innsbruck, RWTH Aachen University, Forschungszentrum Jülich and spin-off Alpine Quantum Technologies (AQT) has demonstrated fault-tolerant quantum computation without any such interruptions.

Mechanical inputs boost diamond quantum sensor states as Q factor tops one million

Most people think of diamonds as high-end adornments. Not Ania Bleszynski Jayich. The UC Santa Barbara physicist sees diamonds, which she grows in the UC Quantum Foundry, as a potentially powerful foundation for quantum sensors. Sensors are currently much farther along in their development than other potential quantum applications. Diamond sensors are particularly promising because diamonds require relatively few quantum bits (qubits) to operate, whereas a quantum computer, for instance, requires more than 100,000, perhaps as many as a million, qubits to handle error correction, one of the main hurdles for quantum computing.

A paper about the latest advance from the Bleszynski Jayich lab, “Spin-embedded diamond optomechanical resonator with a mechanical quality factor exceeding one million,” has been published in the journal Optica.

Quantum ground state of rotation achieved for the first time in two dimensions

Quantum mechanics tells us that a particle can never be perfectly still. But how precisely can it be oriented? A research team at the University of Vienna, together with colleagues at TU Wien and Ulm University, has now cooled the rotational motion of a levitated silica nanorotor all the way to its quantum ground state—in two orientational degrees of freedom.

Reporting in Nature Physics, they show how optical cooling confines the nanoparticle’s orientation to within the bounds of quantum zero-point fluctuations, the unavoidable orientational uncertainty imposed by Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. Such quantum-limited alignment is an important milestone towards rotational matter-wave interferometry and ultra-sensitive quantum torque sensing.

New Advances Bring the Era of Quantum Computers Closer Than Ever

From the article:

” home new advances bring the era of quantum computers closer than ever

Quantum computing New Advances Bring the Era of Quantum Computers Closer Than Ever By Charlie Wood April 3, 2026

Two research groups say they have significantly reduced the amount of qubits and time required to crack common online security technologies.

Kristina Armitage/Quanta Magazine Introduction Some 30 years ago, the mathematician Peter Shor(opens a new tab) took a niche physics project — the dream of building a computer based on the counterintuitive rules of quantum mechanics — and shook the world.

Shor worked out a way for quantum computers to swiftly solve a couple of math problems that classical computers could complete only after many billions of years. Those two math problems happened to be the ones that secured the then-emerging digital world. The trustworthiness of nearly every website, inbox, and bank account rests on the assumption that these two problems are impossible to solve. Shor’s algorithm proved that assumption wrong.

For 30 years, Shor’s algorithm has been a security threat in theory only. Physicists initially estimated that they would need a colossal quantum machine with billions of qubits — the elements used in quantum calculations — to run it. That estimate has come down drastically over the years, falling recently to a million qubits. But it has still always sat comfortably beyond the modest capabilities of existing quantum computers, which typically have just hundreds of qubits.

Continue reading “New Advances Bring the Era of Quantum Computers Closer Than Ever” | >

The Race to Harness Quantum Computing’s Mind-Bending Power | The Future With Hannah Fry

Get “The AI Career Survival Guide” here: https://technomics.gumroad.com/l/ai-survival-guide.
What happens when human labor becomes mathematically obsolete? For thousands of years, the global economy has run on the biological engine of human workers. But a new era has arrived: The Physical Singularity.
In this video, we break down the brutal thermodynamics of the labor inversion, revealing how major AI companies are mass-producing humanoid robots that operate for just 57 cents an hour. We expose the massive industry shift from digital generation to “World Models,” and how China’s manufacturing miracle is driving hardware costs to zero. With 10 billion robots projected by the 2040s, experts like Geoffrey Hinton are warning of a hive-mind “alien intelligence.” The digital era is over. The physical agent era has begun.
Welcome to Technomics. If you want to stay ahead of the curve and understand the real impact of the AI revolution, hit that subscribe button.
Sources & Research Links:
The 57¢ / Hour Labor Inversion Math: https://www.ark-invest.com/articles/valuation-models/ark-pub…oid-robots.
Unitree G1 Official $16,000 Pricing: https://www.unitree.com/g1/
China’s 2024 Robotics Dominance (IFR Report): https://ifr.org/ifr-press-releases/news/china-dominates-industrial-robot-market.
Elon Musk’s 10 Billion Robot Prediction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODsjGOGX_oM
Geoffrey Hinton on AI Hive Mind (“Immortality, but it’s not for us”): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpoRO378qRY
Geordie Rose on Alien Intelligence (“The same way you don’t care about an ant”): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pd4i2YlGmc.
DeepSeek AI Cost Efficiency Breakthroughs: https://www.deepseek.com/
Timestamps:
00;00 — The 57¢ Workforce & The Great Deception.
02;48 — The Math of the Labor Inversion.
05;01 — Why OpenAI Killed Sora (World Models)
09;16 — The Manufacturing Miracle: China’s Hardware Collapse.
12;53 — 10 Billion Robots & Alien Intelligence.
15;58 — How to Survive the Singularity.
Disclaimer:
The content in this video is for educational and informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. The views and opinions expressed in this video are based on current research and industry trends, which are subject to rapid change. We do not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the projections discussed. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research.
#PhysicalSingularity #HumanoidRobots #ArtificialIntelligence #OpenAI #FutureOfWork #TechTrends

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