Related topics: physical review letters , quantum computing , quantum physics , qubit
Quantum mechanics
hideQuantum mechanics is a set of principles underlying the most fundamental known description of all physical systems at the submicroscopic scale (at the atomic level). Notable among these principles are simultaneous wave-like and particle-like behavior of matter and radiation ("Wave–particle duality"), and the prediction of probabilities in situations where classical physics predicts certainties. Classical physics can be derived as a good approximation to quantum physics, typically in circumstances with large numbers of particles. Thus quantum phenomena are particularly relevant in systems whose dimensions are close to the atomic scale, such as molecules, atoms, electrons, protons and other subatomic particles. Exceptions exist for certain systems which exhibit quantum mechanical effects on macroscopic scale; superfluidity is one well-known example. Quantum theory provides accurate descriptions for many previously unexplained phenomena such as black body radiation and stable electron orbits. It has also given insight into the workings of many different biological systems, including smell receptors and protein structures.
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News tagged with quantum mechanics
Researchers make milestone discovery in quantum mechanics
Aug 05, 2008 |
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Researchers at UC Santa Barbara have recently reached what they are calling a milestone in experimental quantum mechanics.
Physicist Proposes Solution to Arrow-of-Time Paradox
Aug 27, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Entropy can decrease, according to a new proposal - but the process would destroy any evidence of its existence, and erase any memory an observer might have of it. It sounds like the plot ...
Quantum Mysticism: Gone but Not Forgotten
Jun 08, 2009 |
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Does mysticism have a place in quantum mechanics today, or is the idea that the mind plays a role in creating reality best left to philosophical meditations? Harvard historian Juan Miguel Marin argues the ...
Quantum Theory May Explain Wishful Thinking
Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry
Apr 14, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Humans don’t always make the most rational decisions. As studies have shown, even when logic and reasoning point in one direction, sometimes we chose the opposite route, motivated by personal ...
3 Questions: Steven Nahn on the elusive Higgs boson
Oct 19, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Troubles at the Large Hadron Collider have led some physicists to suggest the Higgs boson is sabotaging its own discovery. Nahn explains why he disagrees.
Quantum paradox directly observed -- a milestone in quantum mechanics
Mar 04, 2009 |
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In quantum mechanics, a vanguard of physics where science often merges into philosophy, much of our understanding is based on conjecture and probabilities, but a group of researchers in Japan has moved one ...
Schrodinger's Cat Experiment Proposed
Sep 24, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- One of the classical problems in quantum mechanics concerns a man and his feline companion. The man has placed his cat in an opaque tank and is slowing pumping it full of poison. Now until ...
Exerting better control over matter waves
Mar 27, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- “The concept of matter waves is at the heart of quantum mechanics,” Oliver Morsch tells PhysOrg.com. “At the beginning of the last century, scientists discovered that solid particles could exhibit proper ...
Scientists discover quantum fingerprints of chaos
Oct 07, 2009 |
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Chaotic behavior is the rule, not the exception, in the world we experience through our senses, the world governed by the laws of classical physics.
Physicists make discovery in quantum mechanics
Sep 23, 2009 |
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(Santa Barbara, Calif.) -- Physicists at UC Santa Barbara have made an important advance in quantum mechanics using a superconducting electrical circuit. The finding is reported in this week's issue of the journal Nature.
Scientists demonstrate 'universal' programmable quantum processor
Nov 15, 2009 |
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Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology have demonstrated the first "universal" programmable quantum information processor able to run any program allowed by quantum mechanics -- th ...
Study Shows Time Traveling May Not Increase Computational Power
Oct 22, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- For more than 50 years, physicists have been intrigued by the concept of closed time-like curves (CTCs). Because a CTC returns to its starting point, it raises the possibility of traveling backward in time. ...
New method to detect quantum mechanical effects in ordinary objects
Jun 22, 2009 |
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At the quantum level, the atoms that make up matter and the photons that make up light behave in a number of seemingly bizarre ways. Particles can exist in "superposition," in more than one state at the same ...
The day the universe froze: New dark energy model includes cosmological phase transition
May 08, 2009 |
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Imagine a time when the entire universe froze. According to a new model for dark energy, that is essentially what happened about 11.5 billion years ago, when the universe was a quarter of the size it is today.
Quantum gas microscope offers glimpse of quirky ultracold atoms
Nov 04, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Physicists at Harvard University have created a quantum gas microscope that can be used to observe single atoms at temperatures so low the particles follow the rules of quantum mechanics, ...
