A free-falling video camera enabled researchers to observe a falling cloud of particles and infer the particles’ charges.
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Reducing Wires in Quantum Computers
A wire-sharing protocol can minimize the number of wires in a quantum processor without significantly reducing speed, a new theoretical study shows.
As quantum computers continue to grow in size, one of the bottlenecks is the number of control wires that need to be connected to the quantum bits (qubits). A new theoretical study explores so-called time multiplexing, where one wire controls several qubits [1]. The researchers found that although this strategy requires extra processing time, the delays are less than expected, in part because control signals can be scheduled when certain qubits are busy with computations. The results could spur development of the electronic switches needed for time multiplexing in superconducting quantum computers.
Many state-of-the-art quantum computers consist of 100 or more superconducting qubits that operate inside dilution refrigerators at temperatures near absolute zero. Photos of these devices often show a tall, shiny column filled with dozens and dozens of connected wires—which might be mistaken for the qubits. Instead, these wires carry microwave signals from the room-temperature electronics that control the quantum processors to the micrometer-sized qubits inside the cryogenic refrigerator. The number of control wires can limit increases in the sizes of quantum computers. “You would like to have one wire going down to each qubit,” says Anton Frisk Kockum from Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. “But that takes up a lot of space and brings heat into the fridge.”
Using atomic nuclei could allow scientists to read time more precisely than ever
Most clocks, from wristwatches to the systems that run GPS and the internet, work by tracking regular, repeating motions.
To build a clock, you need something that ticks in a perfectly repeatable way. In a pendulum clock, that tick is the regular swinging of the pendulum: back and forth, back and forth, at nearly the same rate each time.
Our team of physicists studies whether an even better kind of clock could one day be built from the atomic nucleus. Today’s best clocks already use atoms to keep extraordinarily accurate time. But in principle, a clock based on a nucleus—the tiny, dense core at the center of an atom—rather than an atom’s electrons, could keep a steadier rhythm because it would be less sensitive to environmental disturbances such as temperature changes. In our research, published in the journal Nature, we measured and interpreted a unique nuclear property of thorium-229 in a crystal that could help make such nuclear clocks possible.
Quantum simulations tackle photon polarization flip, but today’s hardware falls short
For the last 80 years, the theory of quantum electrodynamics (QED), which describes all electromagnetic interactions, has been a cornerstone of the standard model, withstanding the scrutiny of countless experiments and agreeing with observations down to the smallest known precisions. Yet, some high-intensity scales of QED remain unexplored, prompting some to wonder if quantum computers could deal with these scales’ inherent complexity.
Physicists at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign are now testing quantum simulations of these so-called strong-field QED (SFQED) processes, recently translating several processes into the language of quantum computing. Their latest work introduces an innovative method for simulating an SFQED process known as polarization flip on a quantum computer, setting a new benchmark for quantum simulations of high-energy phenomena. The research was published in Physical Review D on March 9, 2026.
3D-printing electronics with focused microwaves redefines possibilities in materials
In a recently published paper in Science Advances, a team led by Rice University’s Yong Lin Kong describes a new 3D-printing process with focused microwaves that overcomes a fundamental constraint of electronics 3D printing that has limited the field’s potential for more than a decade: the inability to heat printed ink—a crucial processing step—without damaging the materials underneath.
The ability to integrate functional materials and spatially program their properties governs both device performance and the limits of what can be built. Existing manufacturing approaches are fundamentally limited in both respects. Electronic components, for instance, are fabricated in massive, centralized foundries, often decoupled from the final device. Integrating them requires complex, labor-intensive assembly that constrains both the form and the function of what can ultimately be created.
Multimaterial 3D printing should, in principle, allow fabrication of free-form architectures in which electronic and mechanical properties are programmed directly into the structure. However, the thermal processing required to render printed electronic inks functional destroys the very materials these devices require.
Next-generation atomic clock successfully tested at sea
Adelaide University researchers have successfully tested a new type of portable atomic clock at sea for the first time, using technology that could help power the next generation of navigation, communications and scientific systems. The research team, from the Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS), developed the highly precise device and trialed it aboard a vessel provided by the Royal Australian Navy in July 2024. They have reported their findings in a new paper published in the journal Optica.
Atomic clocks are the world’s most accurate timekeepers and are essential for technologies such as GPS navigation, telecommunications networks and radio astronomy. However, most high-performance atomic clocks operate in carefully controlled laboratory environments and are not designed to be easily transported or used in challenging real-world conditions. The newly developed device changes that.
Photonics researchers created a portable optical atomic clock that uses laser-cooled atoms of the element ytterbium to keep time with extreme precision. By cooling the atoms with lasers and measuring a very specific atomic transition, the clock can track time far more accurately than conventional systems.
A ‘blob’ in a tank is helping scientists tease out the secrets of turbulence
In a tank on the bottom floor of a University of Chicago research laboratory, scientists summon “The Blob” into existence by firing water jets to create an artfully choreographed series of rings.
First created three years ago in the laboratory of UChicago Prof. William Irvine, in collaboration with graduate student Takumi Matsuzawa, The Blob is one of the only ways that researchers can study the strange properties of turbulence —the chaotic swirling of fluids such as air and water—in its purest form: stationary in a lab and isolated from boundaries.
Turbulence is a bit of a paradox. It governs everything from the movements of ocean currents and hurricane clouds to the swirling of cream in your coffee and blood in your veins. But as widespread as it is, turbulence has been fiendishly difficult for scientists to understand, compared with most other everyday physics phenomena.
Copper blasted into a million-degree plasma strips away 22 electrons in a flash before atoms recover
When laser flashes hit matter, electrons are knocked off their orbits around the atomic nuclei. This can generate extremely hot plasmas composed of charged particles—ions and electrons. Researchers at HZDR have now observed this ionization process in more detail than ever before. To do so, they combined two state-of-the-art lasers: the X-ray free-electron laser and the high-intensity optical laser ReLaX at the HED-HiBEF experiment station at the European XFEL in Schenefeld, near Hamburg. Their findings, published in Nature Communications, deliver fundamental insights into the interaction of high-energy lasers and matter under extreme conditions.
Ionization takes place extremely quickly—in picoseconds, within a few trillionths of seconds. In order to monitor this process in detail, laser pulses must be significantly shorter. “These are exactly the conditions provided by the two lasers that have pulse durations of just 25 and 30 femtoseconds—that is, trillionths of a second,” explains Dr. Lingen Huang, head of experimentation in HZDR’s Division of High-Energy Density.
Initially, an extremely intense flash of light strikes a delicate copper wire that is only about one-seventh the thickness of a human hair. The pulse intensity is approximately 250 trillion megawatts per square centimeter—concentrated on a tiny surface for an extremely short time. Values like this are otherwise achieved only under exceptional conditions, such as in extreme astrophysical environments like the immediate vicinity of neutron stars or during gamma-ray bursts.
Torsion balances set strongest direct limits yet on ultralight dark matter
Dark matter is believed to make up a large fraction of the matter in the universe, yet its true nature remains unknown. Most past experiments have focused on heavier dark matter candidates, while much lighter dark matter, with masses closer to the mass of a neutrino, has been difficult to detect directly because its scattering signals are extremely weak.
An international team of researchers has found that torsion-balance experiments —precision instruments originally built to test the equivalence principle—can double as detectors for very light dark matter. The study, published in Physical Review Letters, provides the strongest direct detection limits to date on interactions between dark matter and nucleons in this mass range from about 0.01 to 1 eV.
The team of researchers, including The University of Tokyo Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (Kavli IPMU, WPI) Professor Shigeki Matsumoto and Kavli IPMU Todai Postdoctoral Research Fellow and JSPS Fellow Jie Sheng, focused on one key physical effect: when dark matter is sufficiently light, its number density in a galaxy becomes very high, and its scattering cross section with macroscopic objects can also be greatly enhanced by coherent effects.
Smart cable sharing gives quantum computers a big boost
A major obstacle in the development of powerful quantum computers is the growing number of cables required to control a computer as the number of qubits increases. Researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden have now demonstrated that several qubits can share the same cable—without significantly increasing computation time. Their study is the most comprehensive of its kind and could become an important piece of the puzzle in developing quantum computers. These computers have the potential to revolutionize such areas as drug development and logistics.
The power of quantum computers lies in what are known as “qubits.” Unlike a conventional computer “bit,” which can have the value 1 or 0, a qubit can have the values 1 and 0 simultaneously—and all states in between, in any combination. This means a quantum computer with 20 qubits can simultaneously represent a combination of more than one million different states, resulting in enormous computational power.
“The global quantum technology race is in full swing, with tech giants currently in the lead with quantum computers based on more than 100 qubits. But to solve real-world societal challenges, quantum computers will need grow much further in size, with thousands or more well-functioning qubits,” says Anton Frisk Kockum, Associate Professor of Applied Quantum Physics at Chalmers University of Technology. At Chalmers, researchers have been developing Sweden’s largest quantum computer within the Wallenberg Centre for Quantum Technology.