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Researchers discover new way to make ‘atomic lasagna’

A research team discovered a method to transform materials with three-dimensional atomic structures into nearly two-dimensional structures – a promising advancement in controlling their properties for chemical, quantum, and semiconducting applications.

The field of materials chemistry seeks to understand, at an atomic level, not only the substances that comprise the world but also how to intentionally design and manufacture them. A pervasive challenge in this field is the ability to precisely control chemical reaction conditions to alter the crystal structure of materials—how their atoms are arranged in space with respect to each other. Controlling this structure is critical to attaining specific atomic arrangements that yield unique behaviors. This process results in novel materials with desirable characteristics for practical applications.

A team of researchers led by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), with contributions from the Colorado School of Mines (Mines), National Institute of Standards and Technology, and Argonne National Laboratory, discovered a method to convert materials from their higher-energy (or metastable) state to their lower-energy, stable state while instilling an ordered and nearly two-dimensional arrangement of atoms—a feat that has the potential to unleash promising material properties.

Quantinuum accelerates the path to Universal Fully Fault-Tolerant Quantum Computing

More recently, in a period where we upgraded our H2 system from 32 to 56 qubits and demonstrated the scalability of our QCCD architecture, we also hit a quantum volume of over two million, and announced that we had achieved “three 9’s” fidelity, enabling real gains in fault-tolerance – which we proved within months as we demonstrated the most reliable logical qubits in the world with our partner Microsoft.

We don’t just promise what the future might look like; we demonstrate it.

Today, at Quantum World Congress, we shared how recent developments by our integrated hardware and software teams have, yet again, accelerated our technology roadmap. It is with the confidence of what we’ve already demonstrated that we can uniquely announce that by the end of this decade Quantinuum will achieve universal fully fault-tolerant quantum computing, built on foundations such as a universal fault-tolerant gate set, high fidelity physical qubits uniquely capable of supporting reliable logical qubits, and a fully-scalable architecture.

Scientists Discover Dark Electrons: A Hidden Quantum State in Solid Matter

If you had a flashlight with you and directed it at a blank wall you would expect it to give a straight line projection however you will find the lit up wall forming rings where the flash light is pointing at. This occurs due to interference and constructive as the light wave forms combine or destructively when the waves structure is out of phase. This occurs when the two waves are in phase with each other thereby producing constructive interference which brought about a bright region. When they do not occur, destructive interference is experienced thus causing the light to fade. Mathematically if S and N waves are 1,800 out of phase the interference actually nulls the signal completely.

Although, light is the most familiar interference, the concept of Interference is not restricted to it. Electrons can also interfere when they have juxtaposable different energy, this leads to the formation of the ‘‘dark electrons’’, electrons in ‘‘dark state’’ not visible by spectroscopic equipment.

Until recently, it was believed that such dark electrons can not be present in solids materials. The problem was that in the solid matter electrons are packed very closely together and thus it was thought to be virtually impossible to reach such ‘perfectly different energies’. Still, the research work conducted by a team from South Korea has revealed that these dark states do exist in condensed matter. This finding, published in Nature Physics can change how quantum physics is perceived.

Two-way mathematical ‘dictionary’ could connect quantum physics with number theory

Several fields of mathematics have developed in total isolation, using their own “undecipherable” coded languages. In a new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Tamás Hausel, professor of mathematics at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), presents “big algebras,” a two-way mathematical ‘dictionary’ between symmetry, algebra, and geometry, that could strengthen the connection between the distant worlds of quantum physics and number theory.

Do we live in a shell universe?

A small black hole must work harder against gravity to keep from collapsing. In rapidly rotating black holes, the Ni shell would collapse to a torus, as possibly reflected in the dramatic photos of .

At a deeper level, the gravity/Λ mechanism might be seen as a kind of quantum overlay of the Ni solutions, a possible step towards reconciliation of the quantum gravity and general relativity perspectives.

Cosmologists will not be quick to endorse a shell universe. There is still much heavy lifting still to do, for instance, in matching the Ni solutions to the observed universe. Dark matter and dark energy will not lightly be cast aside. But if I am right, the universe is not as you may always have thought.

Quantum researchers cause controlled ‘wobble’ in the nucleus of a single atom

Researchers from Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands have been able to initiate a controlled movement in the very heart of an atom. They caused the atomic nucleus to interact with one of the electrons in the outermost shells of the atom. This electron could be manipulated and read out through the needle of a scanning tunneling microscope.