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 physics
New Law of Physics Could Explain Quantum Mysteries
Aug 17, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Since the early days of quantum mechanics, scientists have been trying to understand the many strange implications of the theory: superpositions, wave-particle duality, and the observer’s ...
Researchers Set New Distance Record for Quantum Key Distribution
Jul 21, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Quantum key distribution (QKD) could be the next commercial success of quantum physics, and a recent study has taken the field a step closer to this reality. Researchers from the University ...
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 ...
It's Easier to Observe the Failure of Local Realism than Previously Thought
Mar 04, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Local realism is something we live with every day, even if we don’t realize it. The principle of local realism combines two assumptions: locality and realism. Locality says that distant objects cannot directly ...
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 ...
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.
Evidence of macroscopic quantum tunneling detected in nanowires
May 27, 2009 |
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A team of researchers at the University of Illinois has demonstrated that, counter to classical Newtonian mechanics, an entire collection of superconducting electrons in an ultrathin superconducting wire is ...
Researcher Investigates the Basis of Einstein's First Approximation in the Theory of Relativity
Jul 15, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In his discussion of accelerated motion on page 60 of The Meaning of Relativity, Albert Einstein made an approximation that allowed him to develop the theory of relativity further. Einstein apparently never ...
Quantum measurements: Common sense is not enough
Jul 22, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In comparison to classical physics, quantum physics predicts that the properties of a quantum mechanical system depend on the measurement context, i.e. whether or not other system measurements ...
Physicists take first step towards super-fast search algorithms for quantum computers
Jul 09, 2009 |
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When you toss a coin, you either get heads or tails. By contrast, things are not so definite at the microcosmic level. An atomic 'coin' can display a superposition of heads and tails when it has been thrown. However, this ...
Physicists demonstrate quantum entanglement in mechanical system
Jun 03, 2009 |
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Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology have demonstrated entanglement--a phenomenon peculiar to the atomic-scale quantum world--in a mechanical system similar to those in the macroscopic ...
Flatland physics probes mysteries of superfluidity
Mar 25, 2009 |
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(Physorg.com) -- If physicists lived in Flatland—the fictional two-dimensional world invented by Edwin Abbott in his 1884 novel—some of their quantum physics experiments would turn out differently (not just ...
Quantum computers will require complex software to manage errors
Apr 08, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Highlighting another challenge to the development of quantum computers, theorists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology have shown* that a type of software operation, proposed ...
A step closer to an ultra precise atomic clock
Apr 16, 2009 |
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A clock that is so precise that it loses only a second every 300 million years - this is the result of new research in ultra cold atoms. The international collaboration is comprised of researchers from the ...
Physicists detect entanglement of one photon shared among four locations
May 08, 2009 |
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Scientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have developed an efficient method to detect entanglement shared among multiple parts of an optical system. They show how entanglement, in the form of beams of ...
