{"id":229474,"date":"2026-01-21T01:43:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T07:43:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/a-twitch-in-time-quantum-collapse-models-hint-at-tiny-time-fluctuations"},"modified":"2026-01-21T01:43:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T07:43:07","slug":"a-twitch-in-time-quantum-collapse-models-hint-at-tiny-time-fluctuations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/a-twitch-in-time-quantum-collapse-models-hint-at-tiny-time-fluctuations","title":{"rendered":"A twitch in time? Quantum collapse models hint at tiny time fluctuations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/a-twitch-in-time-quantum-collapse-models-hint-at-tiny-time-fluctuations.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Quantum mechanics is rich with paradoxes and contradictions. It describes a microscopic world in which particles exist in a superposition of states\u2014being in multiple places and configurations all at once, defined mathematically by what physicists call a \u201cwavefunction.\u201d But this runs counter to our everyday experience of objects that are either here or there, never both at the same time.<\/p>\n<p>Typically, physicists manage this conflict by arguing that, when a quantum system comes into contact with a measuring device or an experimental observer, the system\u2019s wavefunction \u201ccollapses\u201d into a single, definite state. Now, with support from the Foundational Questions Institute, FQxI, an international team of physicists has shown that a family of unconventional solutions to this measurement problem\u2014called \u201cquantum collapse models\u201d\u2014has far-reaching implications for the nature of time and for clock precision.<\/p>\n<p>They published their results suggesting a new way to distinguish these rival models from standard quantum theory, in <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.aps.org\/prresearch\/abstract\/10.1103\/p6tj-lg8l\" target=\"_blank\"><i>Physical Review Research<\/i><\/a>, in November 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Quantum mechanics is rich with paradoxes and contradictions. It describes a microscopic world in which particles exist in a superposition of states\u2014being in multiple places and configurations all at once, defined mathematically by what physicists call a \u201cwavefunction.\u201d But this runs counter to our everyday experience of objects that are either here or there, never [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,1617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-229474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-particle-physics","category-quantum-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229474\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}