Sharing my latest Forbes article: by Chuck Brooks.
Thanks for reading and sharing!
#cybersecurity #tech #ai #quantum #space Forbes
Artificial intelligence and quantum computing are no longer speculative technologies. They are reshaping cybersecurity, economic viability, and managing risk in real time.
When we talk about the universe, we usually imagine space filled with galaxies, stars, and matter expanding endlessly in all directions. It feels natural to think of the universe as a vast container — a place where everything exists. But modern theoretical physics suggests that this picture may be deeply misleading.
In this video, we explore a more fundamental question: what is the universe really made of? Is it space? Matter? Energy? Or something far more abstract than our everyday intuition allows?
Drawing on ideas associated with Leonard Susskind, this long-form exploration challenges the assumption that the universe is a physical stage where reality takes place. Instead, physics increasingly points toward a universe defined not by objects and locations, but by information, relationships, and boundaries.
Black hole physics, quantum theory, and modern cosmology have forced scientists to rethink the foundations of reality. In some of the deepest descriptions of nature, space and time no longer appear as fundamental ingredients. What we experience as a three-dimensional universe may be an emergent structure — a convenient description rather than the true underlying reality.
Rather than focusing on equations, this video emphasizes intuition and conceptual understanding. Through thought experiments and simple analogies, we examine why the universe feels like a place, why that picture works so well at human scales, and why it may break down at the most fundamental level.
What if you could create new materials just by shining a light at them? To most, this sounds like science fiction or alchemy, but to physicists investigating the burgeoning field of Floquet engineering, this is the goal. With a periodic drive, like light, scientists can “dress up” the electronic structure of any material, altering its fundamental properties—such as turning a simple semiconductor into a superconductor.
While the theory of Floquet physics has been investigated since a bold proposal by Oka and Aoki in 2009, only a handful of experiments within the past decade have managed to demonstrate Floquet effects. And though these experiments show the feasibility of Floquet engineering, the field has been limited by the reliance on light, which requires very high intensities that almost vaporize the material while still only achieving moderate results.
But now, a diverse team of researchers from around the world, co-led by the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) and Stanford University have demonstrated a powerful new alternative approach to Floquet engineering by showing that excitons can produce Floquet effects much more efficiently than light. Their results are now published in Nature Physics.
The copenhagen interpretation & retroactivity. quantum mechanics basics:
Particles exist in a superposition of states until observed.
Measurement “collapses” the wave function into a definite outcome.
Retrocausality Debate:
Some physicists have explored whether quantum events can appear to be influenced by future measurements.
This is sometimes described as the universe “responding retroactively,” but it’s a controversial interpretation, not mainstream science.
Scientists have discovered a new quantum state of matter that connects two significant areas of physics, potentially leading to advancements in computing, sensing and materials science.
A study published in Nature Physics, co-led by Rice University’s Qimiao Si, brings together quantum criticality, where electrons fluctuate between different phases, and electronic topology, which describes a form of quantum organization based on the wave behavior of electrons.
The researchers found that strong interactions among electrons can produce topological behavior, paving the way for new technologies that could use this quantum state in real-world applications.
Neutron scattering and simulations reveal why a promising Kitaev candidate freezes into order instead of forming a quantum spin liquid.
Most magnets are predictable. Cool them down, and their tiny magnetic moments snap into place like disciplined soldiers. However, physicists have long suspected that, under the right conditions, magnetism might refuse to settle even in extreme cold.
This restless state, known as a quantum spin liquid, could unlock new kinds of particles and serve as a foundation for quantum technologies that are far more stable than today’s fragile systems.
At Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), researchers have now created and closely examined a new magnetic material that brings this strange possibility a little closer to reality, even if it doesn’t quite cross the finish line yet.
Scientists have demonstrated a new method that could allow quantum information to be safely backed up, overcoming one of the longest-standing limitations in quantum computing without violating the fundamental laws that govern quantum systems.
The research describes a way to encode the information contained in a qubit across multiple entangled systems, allowing the original quantum state to be recovered later without directly copying it.
One intriguing method that could be used to form the qubits needed for quantum computers involves electrons hovering above liquid helium. But it wasn’t clear how data in this form could be read easily.
Now RIKEN researchers may have found a solution. Their work is published in the journal Physical Review Letters.
During chemical reactions, atoms in the reacting substances break their bonds and re-arrange, forming different chemical products. This process entails the movement of both electrons (i.e., negatively charged particles) and nuclei (i.e., the positively charged central parts of atoms). Valence electrons are shared and re-arranged between different atoms, creating new bonds.
The movements of electrons and nuclei during chemical reactions are incredibly fast, in many cases only lasting millionths of a billionth of a second (i.e., femtoseconds). Yet reliably tracking and understanding these movements could help to shed new light on how specific molecules are formed, as well as on the underpinnings of quantum mechanical phenomena.
Researchers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University recently introduced a new approach to observe chemical reactions as they unfold, precisely tracking the movement of electrons and atomic nuclei as a molecule breaks apart. This strategy, outlined in a paper published in Physical Review Letters, was successfully used to image the photodissociation of ammonia (NH₃), the process in which a NH₃ molecule absorbs light and breaks down into smaller pieces.