Showing posts with label light hype. Show all posts
Showing posts with label light hype. Show all posts

Saturday, July 11, 2026

Neologistic Supremacy


Holographic light engine boosts tissue-like 3D printing efficiency by 70 times
May 2026, phys.org

Holographic Light Engines - 150-mW laser diode for tomographic volumetric additive manufacturing system to solidify entire millimeter-scale objects within seconds, and centimeter-scale objects within minutes

via EPFL's Laboratory of Applied Photonic Devices: Maria Isabel Álvarez-Castaño et al, High-efficiency multi-scale holographic volumetric 3D printing with a phase light modulator, Light: Science & Applications (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41377-026-02331-4



Laser-powered engines may soon support 'intelligent' 6G networks
May 2026, phys.org

Light Engines, aka Photonic Engine - lasers that can transfer large amounts of data over long distances by emitting high-quality white light

via University of Technology in Guangzhou: Tailoring quasi-transparent ceramic as a laser-driven photonic engine for kilometer-level white light communication, Matter (2026). DOI: 10.1016/j.matt.2026.102822.


New kind of dark tourism emerging in online 'Backrooms,' study shows
May 2026, phys.org

Para-Terrestrial Dark Tourism - encounters with environments that feel place-like yet sit beyond conventional geography because they exist entirely online. ...

This comes at the time of the release of the movie Backrooms, about these kinds of spaces. ... I'm lost actually. The paper is like 3 paragraphs long, and although they use the word Žižekian, which is cool, what's written is almost complete gobbledegook. I still, by the end of the paper, have no idea what they're talking about, even the original rationale of the paper...like how much can we talk about a default page on mario paint and what it means to the cultural zeitgeist? They made a whole movie about it so I guess it's important. Right, because movies are still important. Wrong, the whole world is one big advertisement to manipulate us into buying The Way. And if you want to learn more about how the international academic community is co-opted by fake publishing houses, please learn more here: DEF CON 26 - Svea, Suggy, Till - Inside the Fake Science Factory - 2018 [link] ; OmniScript [wiki link] 

via Lancaster University Management School: Sophie James et al, When dark tourism goes para-terrestrial: Online legend-tripping and touring the void, Annals of Tourism Research (2026). DOI: 10.1016/j.annals.2026.104172


Unlocking soft robotics control with AI's cousin: Reservoir computing
May 2026, phys.org

Soft Robotics - made with a combination of soft materials and novel controls, soft robotics have a greater range of motion and more fluidity and flexibility than traditional rigid robotics.

Neural Reservoir - researchers input data about the movement of virtual soft robots, set parameters for what they expected to happen, ran virtual trials, and then analyzed the results. ... they created virtual models of different variations of movement and tested how they behaved. When they fed those results back into the system, a new model for the behavior of a soft robotic arm began to emerge—along with a new approach to the most effective way to control the arm.

via Virginia Tech: Noel Naughton et al, Neural reservoir control of a bio-hybrid soft arm, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2026). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2522094123


Introducing Weather Jiu-Jitsu, a new approach to avert catastrophic weather events
Jun 2026, phys.org

Weather Jiu-Jitsu - small adjustments that carefully leverage the atmosphere's sensitivity to disturbance could avert the worst effects of weather disasters ... Their modeling suggested that small, carefully timed cloud-seeding operations applied days before the peak of an extreme weather event could have shifted the track of 2012's Hurricane Sandy by about 300 miles (480 kilometers) to miss New York City, raised the low temperature of the 2021 Texas freeze by about 18 degrees Fahrenheit and reduced the amount of precipitation carried by a 2022 atmospheric river that caused flooding in California by about 5%.

via Arizone State: Huang Q, et al. Weather Jiu-Jitsu: Prospects for atmospheric nudging to defuse the impact of catastrophic weather extremes. PLOS Water (2026). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pwat.0000562

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Friday, June 12, 2026

Optomania


I'm starting to get bedazzled by the light hype, it's like there's nothing you can't say at this point that might not be actually true. Disembodied decentralized swarm neurons? Yes. Artificial evolution engine running on hijacked bacterial botnets? Sure. Non-electronics-based large-scale programmable incoherent photonic neuromorphic computing system? That is exactly what was going to happen all along. The somatic override helmet that shoots lasers into your bloodstream is a bit over the top however. 


When light 'thinks' like the brain: The connection between photons and artificial memory
Feb 2026, phys.org

(It was a surprise they said.) Italian researchers show that identical photons propagating within optical circuits spontaneously behave like a Hopfield Network, one of the best-known mathematical models used to describe the associative memory mechanisms of the human brain.

"In this system, photons are not merely carriers of data, but themselves become the 'neurons' of an associative memory."

via Italian Institute of Technology, Nanotechnology of the National Research Council, and Sapienza University of Rome: Gennaro Zanfardino et al, Multiphoton Quantum Simulation of the Generalized Hopfield Memory Model, Physical Review Letters (2026). DOI: 10.1103/945c-11wt



Light-guided 'optovolution' evolves proteins that switch states on schedule
Mar 2026, phys.org

Optovolution - uses light to guide the evolution of proteins with dynamic, multi‑state, and computational functions - making yes-or-no decisions based on specific rules

The team built their system in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, widely used to brew beer and a laboratory workhorse. They rewired the yeast's cell cycle so that progression depended on the protein to be evolved, switching cleanly between off and on states.

The key was linking the protein's output signal to a cell‑cycle regulator that is essential at one stage but toxic at another. If the protein of interest stayed on or off for too long, the yeast cell stalled or died. Only cells in which the protein oscillated correctly could keep dividing.

via EPFL Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne Laboratory of the Physics of Biological Systems: Light-directed evolution of dynamic, multi-state, and computational protein functionalities., Cell (2026). DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2026.02.002


Photonic chips advance real-time learning in spiking neural systems
Mar 2026, phys.org

"Photonic spiking neural systems use brief optical pulses, or spikes, to emulate neural signaling, but they can typically only process the linear parts of computation using light. Previously, the nonlinear steps that make learning and decision-making possible required the signal to be converted back into electronic signals. This adds delay and undercuts the speed and energy advantages of photonics."

via Xidian University in China: Shui Xiang et al, Nonlinear Photonic Neuromorphic Chips for Spiking Reinforcement Learning, Optica (2026). DOI: 10.1364/optica.578687


Physicists create optical phenomenon inspired by the quantum Hall and spin Hall effects
Mar 2026, phys.org

The findings open up new possibilities for applications such as topological polariton lasers, spin-based transistors, and optical information processing.

via University of Würzburg: Simon Widmann et al, Artificial gauge fields and dimensions in a polariton hofstadter ladder, Nature Communications (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-026-68530-0


Ultrasound creates light inside the body, opening a new path to targeted treatments
Apr 2026, phys.org

I believe they are shooting lasers through the fluids in your blood vessels - I'll be on my way now.

Nanomaterials distributed through the bloodstream to turn ultrasound waves into precise points of light - "With these materials, we can produce light emission in the brain, in the gut, in the spinal cord, in the muscle—virtually anywhere—without needing a physical implant."

They started with large, ceramic particles that give off light in response to mechanical stress, which can be created by ultrasound waves. Then they created a biocompatible coating for the particles and injected them into mice.

The researchers created a small ultrasound-producing hat for mice, and used it to create light that stimulated different neurons, causing the mouse to turn left or right depending on the part of the brain being activated.

via Stanford University: Shan Jiang et al, An ultrasound-scanning in vivo light source, Nature Materials (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41563-026-02556-z

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Thursday, December 18, 2025

The Op Box


A major shift is happening right now, in fact it's not an exaggeration to call it a revolution. Back in the day, like back when Daniel DeFoe was writing The Plague Years, we had hydraulics and water pressure through pipes and channels, and that was the predominant technological paradigm. This started with agriculture and irrigation. Everything was explained as if it were pipes and pressure. Somewhere in between the pipes went from carrying water to carrying steam, and then air itself, and we got the internal combustion engine, right after the steam engine. That gave us the industrial revolution.

Then electricity happened. And it's still electricity. The internet is a bunch of electrical pulse patterns. Even the fiber optic cable, which carries photons, gets converted to electrical signals at the end. That's about to be over. 

Now it's light. Granted, quantum computers can use electrons, which aren't photons, but the end result is mostly photons doing the work. 

And this is a big deal, revolutionary you could call it, because it seems inevitable that this will upend the current "revolution" in artificial intelligence, which to be honest seems more about economic happenstance and less about revolutionary technology. Using GPUs for deep learning is kind of a kludge, meaning it wasn't designed this way on purpose, instead someone (Bill Dally to Andrew Ng?) said, hey I bet these GPUs could do what you're trying to do better, and so it happened. It's still electricity.

But not anymore. Now it's light, and that changes everything, and that's because the light itself computes. That's right, the light itself is the computer. ("But that doesn't even make sense." Well you're not wrong.) Still not crazy enough? Optical origami computers; which were of course discovered by accident. 


Researchers pioneer optical generative models, ushering in a new era of sustainable generative AI
Aug 2025, phys.org

I keep trying but can't seem to explain how different this is to what's currently happening in the world of computing. Then again, I was also confused when Deep Seek released their model and yet it took two weeks for the stock market to realize (true story). To be clear, this requires no internet connection and no data center. In other words, today you might call this magic. 

Optical generative models capable of producing novel images using the physics of light instead of conventional electronic computation.

The models integrate a shallow digital encoder with a free-space diffractive optical decoder, trained together as one system. Random noise is first processed into "optical generative seeds," which are projected onto a spatial light modulator and illuminated by laser light. As this light propagates through the static, pre-optimized diffractive decoder, it produces images that statistically follow the target data distribution. These models could be embedded in smart glasses, AR/VR headsets, or mobile platforms to enable real-time, on-the-go generative AI.

via UCLA Engineering Institute for Technology Advancement: Shiqi Chen et al, Optical generative models, Nature (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09446-5



Sustainable AI: Physical neural networks exploit light to train more efficiently
Sep 2025, phys.org

Physical Neural Networks - analog circuits that directly exploit the laws of physics like properties of light beams or quantum phenomena to process information.

Mathematical operations can now be performed through light interference mechanisms on silicon microchips barely a few square millimeters in size.

via Polytechnic University of Milan, École Polytechnique Fédérale, Stanford, Cambridge, and the Max Planck Institute: Ali Momeni et al, Training of physical neural networks, Nature (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09384-2


First device based on 'optical thermodynamics' can route light without switches
Oct 2025, phys.org

Optical Thermodynamics - framework captures how light behaves in nonlinear lattices using analogs of familiar thermodynamic processes such as expansion, compression, and even phase transitions. Rather than actively steering the signal, the system is engineered so that the light routes itself. "First optical device that follows the emerging framework of optical thermodynamics".

via University of Southern California: Hediyeh M. Dinani et al, Universal routing of light via optical thermodynamics, Nature Photonics (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41566-025-01756-4

First electronic–photonic quantum chip created in commercial foundry
Jul 2025, phys.org

Microring Resonators - a "quantum light factory"; a kind of photonic device that combines quantum light sources and stabilizing electronics using a standard 45-nanometer semiconductor manufacturing process to produce reliable streams of correlated photon pairs.

via Boston University, UC Berkeley, and Northwestern University, and GlobalFoundries and Silicon Valley startup Ayar Labs: Danielius Kramnik et al, Scalable feedback stabilization of quantum light sources on a CMOS chip, Nature Electronics (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41928-025-01410-5


Photonic origami folds glass into microscopic 3D optical devices
Aug 2025, phys.org

The laser-induced technique triggers precise bending in 3-D printed ultra-thin glass sheets that are so smooth that light reflects off them without distortion.

Surprise - The new photonic origami method was discovered by chance when Carmon asked graduate student Manya Malhotra to pinpoint where an invisible laser was hitting the glass by increasing the power until the spot glowed. Instead of glowing, the glass folded - revealing a simple and unexpected way to achieve glass folding. Malhotra then became the pioneering expert in photonic origami.

Using the new photonic origami approach, the researchers were able to bend sheets of glass up to 10 microns thick into shapes ranging from a 90-degree knee to helices. They were able to do this with fine control, down to 0.1 microradians.

"This new technique brings silica photonics - using glass to guide and control light - into the third dimension."

via Tel Aviv University: Manya Malhotra et al, Photonic Origami of Silica on a Silicon Chip with Microresonators and Concave Mirrors, Optica (2025). DOI: 10.1364/OPTICA.560597


Beyond electronics: Optical system performs feature extraction with unprecedented low latency
Oct 2025, phys.org

This is what I call the Op Box, I'm imagining a new type of computer, in the way the Steam Machine has (or is about to) upend the personal computer market, this Op Box will upend the very concept of a computer, and what it means to compute. 

Optical Diffraction Operators - plate-like structures that perform calculations as light propagates through them. 

This optical feature extraction engine de-serializes the data stream by sampling the input signal into multiple stable parallel branches. [For feature extraction, read recogntion, like facial recognition, etc.]

via Tsinghua University: Run Sun et al, High-speed and low-latency optical feature extraction engine based on diffraction operators, Advanced Photonics Nexus (2025). DOI: 10.1117/1.apn.4.5.056012

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Friday, January 10, 2025

Light Hype and the Optical Revolution


Study suggests optogenetics can drive muscle contraction with greater control, less fatigue than electrical stimulation
May 2024, phys.org

Optogenetics meets neuroprosthetics - Instead of using electricity to stimulate muscles, they used light, and synthetic nerve fibers activate the muscles 

via MIT's Center for Bionics: Guillermo Herrera-Arcos et al, Closed-loop optogenetic neuromodulation enables high-fidelity fatigue-resistant muscle control, Science Robotics (2024). DOI: 10.1126/scirobotics.adi8995.



New 'game-changing' discovery for light-driven artificial intelligence
Aug 2024, phys.org

photonic AI accelerator - an emerging technology where photons are used instead of electrons to perform AI computations.

via Universities of Oxford, Muenster, Heidelberg, and Ghent: Bowei Dong et al, Partial coherence enhances parallelized photonic computing, Nature (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07590-y

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Thursday, October 3, 2024

Quantum Always


Physicists demonstrate first metro-area quantum computer network in Boston
May 2024, phys.org

Quantums now in the US, the last one was in China:

Using existing Boston-area telecommunication fiber, their photons were deployed over a roughly 22-mile loop through Cambridge, Somerville, Watertown, and Boston, with quantum computers at the nodes.

via Harvard: Mikhail Lukin, Entanglement of nanophotonic quantum memory nodes in a telecom network, Nature (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07252-z.



A place to study qubits shielded from the effects of cosmic rays
Jun 2024, phys.org

QUIET and LOUD - a pair of quantum sensors, one above ground and one under. 

via Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the National Quantum Initiative


A framework to construct quantum spherical codes
Jun 2024, phys.org

Photonic quantum coding theory:

All quantum codes require the superposition of something, and Albert and his colleagues realized that it made sense to superimpose well-separated points on a sphere. Their framework builds on a previously proposed method to map electromagnetic signals of any frequency into points on a sphere.

"There is an old and very general technique by the founder of information theory, Claude Shannon, that maps an arbitrary electromagnetic signal of fixed amplitude but of any frequency into a point on the sphere," Albert explained. "This means that efficiently sending classical information using light boils down to packing as many points on the sphere as possible while making sure that noise does not cause them to overlap."

via NIST and University of Maryland: Shubham P. Jain et al, Quantum spherical codes, Nature Physics (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-024-02496-y


Pseudomagic quantum states: A path to quantum supremacy
Jun 2024, phys.org

Don't even bother to understand, just know magic states: 

A stabilizer state is a type of quantum state that can be efficiently simulated on a classical computer, and nonstabilizerness or magic refers to a measure of the non-classical resources possessed by a quantum state.

Pseudomagic quantum states appear to have the properties of nonstabilizer states (complexity and non-classical operations) but are computationally indistinguishable from random quantum states, at least to an observer with limited computational resources.

via Harvard University and Freie Universität Berlin: Andi Gu et al, Pseudomagic Quantum States, Physical Review Letters (2024). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.210602.


Quantum annealer improves understanding of quantum many-body systems
Jun 2024, phys.org 

They used a quantum annealer to model a real-life quantum material and showed that the quantum annealer can directly mirror the microscopic interactions of electrons in the material.

In this study, the scientists investigated the quantum material 1T-TaS2.

"We have placed the system in a non-equilibrium state and observed how the electrons in the solid-state lattice rearrange themselves after a non-equilibrium phase transition, both experimentally and through simulations."

The scientists demonstrated that the quantum annealer's qubit interconnections can directly mirror the microscopic interactions between electrons in a quantum material. Only one single parameter in the quantum annealer must be modified. The outcome aligns closely with the experimental findings.

via Forschungszentrum Jülich Supercomputing Center and D-Wave: Jaka Vodeb et al, Non-equilibrium quantum domain reconfiguration dynamics in a two-dimensional electronic crystal and a quantum annealer, Nature Communications (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-49179-z

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Friday, July 19, 2024

The Large Photon Destroyer


Light is the next electricity. It runs quantum computers, it blows GPU-based neural networks out of the water, and it makes computing parameters like speed, bandwidth, power, etc., perform on scales we do not understand. The way the internet changed society is the way light will change computing. 

Scientists compute with light inside hair-thin optical fiber
Jan 2024, phys.org

I'll bet it does

"We can encode a lot of information on a single particle of light. On its spatial structure, on its temporal structure, on its color. And if you can compute with all of those properties at once, that unlocks a massive amount of processing power."

via Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh: Inverse design of high-dimensional quantum optical circuits in a complex medium, Nature Physics (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-023-02319-6.

Somewhat related image credit: the quantum tornado machine for black hole research - Leonardo Solidoro for University of Nottingham - Mar 2024


Key innovation in photonic components could transform supercomputing technology
Feb 2024, phys.org

Trying to get to the point because I'll bet it's important:

Programmable photonic integrated circuits (PPICs) - The key to the advance has been to apply innovative concepts to the fabrication of the required silicon-based parts. Crucially, the manufacturing process can be used with conventional silicon wafer technology. This makes it compatible with the large-scale production of photonic chips essential to commercial applications.

At the heart of the new advance are tiny components that can interconvert optical, electronic, and mechanical changes to perform the variety of communication and mechanical functions needed by an integrated circuit.

They reduced the power consumption to femtowatt levels, which is over a million times an improvement compared to the previous state of the art.

In a move away from the dependence on temperature changes required by the dominant "thermo-optic" systems currently in use, these new components manipulate a feature of light waves called "phase" and control the coupling between different parallel waveguides, which guide and constrain the light. 

via Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology and Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology: Dong Uk Kim et al, Programmable photonic arrays based on microelectromechanical elements with femtowatt-level standby power consumption, Nature Photonics (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s41566-023-01327-5


Neural networks made of light: Research team develops AI system in optical fibers
Feb 2024, phys.org

NVIDA called, wants deep hype back

"We utilize a single optical fiber to mimic the computational power of numerous neural networks"

via Leibniz-Institut für Photonische Technologien: Bennet Fischer et al, Neuromorphic Computing via Fission‐based Broadband Frequency Generation, Advanced Science (2023). DOI: 10.1002/advs.202303835

PENTATRAP device for measuring quantum states - MPIK - Apr 2024

All-light communication network bridges space, air and sea for seamless connectivity
Feb 2024, phys.org

"The all-light communication could be used in oceans and lakes, for example, where sensors gather ecological data and communicate with surface buoys. The data could then be sent wirelessly over the water surface or across long-distance transmission links between cities. The network can also connect to the internet via a modem, granting people who might be in a remote ocean location, for example, access to the backbone network for information sharing."

  • They used blue light for underwater communication because seawater has a reduced absorption window for blue-green light, allowing it to travel farther underwater compared to other wavelengths.
  • White LEDs are used to transmit information between objects, such as buoys or ships that are above water.
  • For connections with airborne devices such as drones, deep ultraviolet light is used. This provides solar-blind communication, which prevents interference from sunlight.
  • Finally, for point-to-point communication in free space, near-infrared laser diodes were applied because they emit directional light with high optical power. 

via Nanjing University and Suzhou Lighting Chip Monolithic Optoelectronics Technology Co: Linning Wang et al, All-light communication network for space-air-sea integrated interconnection, Optics Express (2024). DOI: 10.1364/OE.514930


Using sound waves for photonic machine learning: Study lays foundation for reconfigurable neuromorphic building blocks
Apr 2024, phys.org

I don't really understand this but it's important 

  • reconfigurable neuromorphic building blocks
  • photonic machine learning

The researchers use light to create temporary acoustic waves in an optical fiber. The sound waves generated in this way can for instance enable a recurrent functionality in a telecom optical fiber, which is essential to interpreting contextual information such as language.

The sound waves have a much longer transmission time than the optical information stream. Therefore, they remain in the optical fiber longer and can be linked to each subsequent processing step in turn. 

FYI - A traditional fully connected neural network on a computer faces difficulties capturing context because it requires access to memory. In order to overcome this challenge, neural networks have been equipped with recurrent operations that enable internal memory and are capable of capturing contextual information.

Optoacoustic REcurrent Operator (OREO) - harnesses the intrinsic properties of an optical waveguide without the need for an artificial reservoir or newly fabricated structures.

via Stiller Research Group at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light and the Englund Research Group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology: Steven Becker, Dirk Englund, and Birgit Stiller, An optoacoustic field-programmable perceptron for recurrent neural networks, Nature Communications (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-47053-6.


Internet can achieve quantum speed with light saved as sound
Apr 2024, phys.org

Same thing as above

A small drum can store data sent with light in its sonic vibrations, and then forward the data with new light sources when needed again.

via University of Copenhagen's Niels Bohr Institute: Mads Bjerregaard Kristensen et al, Long-lived and Efficient Optomechanical Memory for Light, Physical Review Letters (2024). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.100802

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Tuesday, May 2, 2023

More Moiré


At the confluence of twisted magic angle nanosandwiches and the much bigger news of the accidental Kuhning of the universe comes an unlikely character, the moiré lattice.

It's a grid, the two-dimensional piece of molecular paper epitomized as the graphene sheet, but it's two of them sandwiched on top of each other, and then turning one slightly so the grid no longer matches up. It's like the chain link fence that creates undulating optical illusions when layered with another fence; these two nanosheets do weird things to the field that exist between them. 

Moiré lattices are being used to create weird crystals, so they're a big part of optoelectronics because crystals manipulate lasers. And they're also providing a novel model of physical interaction that's unexpectedly mirrored in the fabric of spacetime, which might give us a very different idea about how the universe works. 


New quasiparticle discovered in moiré patterns
Nov 2022, phys.org

They found an exciton in there - an electrically neutral quasiparticle that can carry energy and consists of an electron and electron "hole" that can be created for example by light impinging certain semiconductors and other materials.

Coming soon -  "post-silicon nanoscale optoelectronic devices"

via University of Texas at Austin: Mit H. Naik et al, Intralayer charge-transfer moiré excitons in van der Waals superlattices, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04991-9


Moiré superlattices show superpower in photonics and optoelectronics
Mar 2023, phys.org

"The era of moiré photonics and optoelectronics is coming."

Moiré superlattices are artificial quantum materials formed by vertically stacking two or more two-dimensional (2D) layered materials with a slight lattice mismatch and/or a small rotational twist. They introduce a potential landscape of much larger length scale than the crystal periodicity of the constituent 2D layers, providing a novel paradigm for engineering band structures and hence a plethora of exotic quantum phenomena.

via Chinese Academy of Sciences:  Luojun Du et al, Moiré photonics and optoelectronics, Science (2023). DOI: 10.1126/science.adg0014.

See also:

Post Script:
New one for me - "Ab initio" calculations ("from the beginning) are computations of electronic orbitals with no other hypotheses than Coulomb interactions between all electrons and nuclei with electrons obeying Fermi statistics with the Pauli exclusion principle.

Or - the only inputs into an ab initio calculation are physical constants; Ab initio quantum chemistry methods attempt to solve the electronic Schrödinger equation given the positions of the nuclei and the number of electrons [wiki]

Here's some examples:
Artist Frank Michielli does some cool fence-art



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Monday, May 1, 2023

The Photonic Phreakout


Optical this and photon that, opto-genetics, opto-electronics, opto-dildonics. Optical quantum computers made of crystals and light, the fastest computers you can imagine, tuned lasers that can bleep your brain through your retina and treat depression, and optical tractor beams, that's right, aka quantum tweezers.

This is not to detract from the renewed interest in the fundamental nature of time, by way of "time crystals", and of something I will call time lasers, because where there's crystals there's lasers, but that idea hasn't been discovered yet. 


Laser attack blinds autonomous vehicles, deleting pedestrians and confusing cars
Oct 2022, phys.org

Expertly timed lasers shined at an approaching lidar system can create a blind spot in front of the vehicle large enough to completely hide moving pedestrians and other obstacles

via University of Florida, the University of Michigan and the University of Electro-Communications in Japan: Yulong Cao et al, You Can't See Me: Physical Removal Attacks on LiDAR-based Autonomous Vehicles Driving Frameworks, arXiv (2022). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2210.09482.

 
Researchers create an optical tractor beam that pulls macroscopic objects
Jan 2023, phys.org

Optical manipulation such as levitation and rotation: Optical tweezers, for example, are commonly used scientific instruments that use laser light to hold and manipulate tiny objects such as atoms or cells. We could also use laser light to create an optical tractor beam.

via QingDao University of Science and Technology in China: Lei Wang et al, Macroscopic laser pulling based on the Knudsen force in rarefied gas, Optics Express (2022). DOI: 10.1364/OE.480019


Deep learning-designed diffractive processor computes hundreds of transformations in parallel
Jan 2023, phys.org

Optical computers use light instead of electricity to perform computations, and now they can make massively parallel, wavelength-multiplexed diffractive processors.

via SPIE International Society for Optics and Photonics and UCLA: Jingxi Li et al, Massively parallel universal linear transformations using a wavelength-multiplexed diffractive optical network, Advanced Photonics (2023). DOI: 10.1117/1.AP.5.1.016003

AI Art - Cymatics - 2022

A new type of photonic time crystal gives light a boost
Apr 2023, phys.org

While some physicists were initially skeptical that time crystals could exist, recent experiments have succeeding in creating them.

"We found that reducing the dimensionality from a 3D to a 2D structure made the implementation significantly easier, ..."

via Aalto University, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and Stanford University: Xuchen Wang et al, Metasurface-Based Realization of Photonic Time Crystals, Science Advances (2023). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adg7541.


Optical switching at record speeds opens door for ultrafast, light-based electronics and computers
Mar 2023, phys.org

Imagine a home computer operating 1 million times faster than the most expensive hardware on the market. Light-based optical computing with optical transistors is a marked improvement from the semiconductor-based transistors that currently run the world.

Data transfer speeds exceeding a petahertz, measured at the attosecond time scale.

via University of Arizona: Dandan Hui et al, Ultrafast optical switching and data encoding on synthesized light fields, Science Advances (2023). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adf1015


Recreating the double-slit experiment that proved the wave nature of light in time, instead of space
Apr 2023, phys.org

Now, a team led by Imperial College London physicists has performed the experiment using "slits" in time rather than space. They achieved this by firing light through a material that changes its properties in femtoseconds (quadrillionths of a second), only allowing light to pass through at specific times in quick succession.

The team next want to explore the phenomenon in a "time crystal," which is analogous to an atomic crystal, but where the optical properties vary in time.

Co-author Professor Stefan Maier said, "The concept of time crystals has the potential to lead to ultrafast, parallelized optical switches."

via Imperial College London: Romain Tirole et al, Double-slit time diffraction at optical frequencies, Nature Physics (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-023-01993-w. 

Light shaped into a twisted smoke ring - Y Shen and Z Zhu at SPIE King's College - 2023

Post Script:
Topology also plays a big part in the coming light hype cycle -- you might know topology as Gödel, Escher, Bach's Eternal Golden Braid, but it also has a strong link to the hyperbolic geometries of hallucinogenic hero doses. They make quantum computers work better, so we're trying to tie light into knots to make mega-sentient intelligentities, faster.

Photonic hopfions: Light shaped as a smoke ring that behaves like a particle
Jan 2023, phys.org

Topology, hyperbolic geometry, toroids, skyrmions, and now -- new, very unusual, structured-light family of 3D topological solitons, the photonic hopfions, where the topological textures and topological numbers can be freely and independently tuned. 

via SPIE International Society for Optics and Photonics, University of Southampton, and King's College London: Yijie Shen et al, Topological transformation and free-space transport of photonic hopfions, Advanced Photonics (2023). DOI: 10.1117/1.AP.5.1.015001


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Monday, March 13, 2023

Of Course Biocomputers Are Real, They're Us


I always thought mass social behavioral modification would be via olfactory receptor manipulation, but this looks like another option:

Controlling nematode worm behavior using two different light-sensitive proteins called opsins*
Nov 2022, phys.org

So they are "introducing" new sensory cells into the C. elegans. They find light-sensitive cells (opsins) in other animals, and put them in the worms.

One opsin is sensitive to white light and comes from a mosquito, another is sensitive to ultraviolet light and comes from a lamprey. These "tuned" light-receptor cells are then introduced to parts of the worm's motor neurons.

When you shine light on the worm, it stimulates the motor neurons, making them move. They made the white-light opsins to make the worm go, and the UV light makes it stop.

They can then move the worm, or rather make the worm move itself, by shining light on it. Fuck off.

*Opsins, like olfactory receptros, are GPCR's -- G protein-coupled receptors

via Graduate School of Human Life and Ecology at Osaka Metropolitan University: Mitsumasa Koyanagi et al, High-performance optical control of GPCR signaling by bistable animal opsins MosOpn3 and LamPP in a molecular property–dependent manner, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2204341119


Scientists create living smartwatch powered by slime mold
Dec 2022, phys.org

Using the electrically conductive single-cell organism known as "slime mold," the researchers created a watch that only works when the organism is healthy, requiring the user to provide it with food and care.

The organism (Physarum polycephalum or slime mold) is placed in an enclosure on the watch, and the user must regularly feed it a mixture of water and oats to induce its growth. When the slime mold reaches the other side of the enclosure, it forms an electrical circuit that activates the heart rate monitor function. The organism can also enter a dormant state when not fed, allowing for revival days, months, or even years later.

The researchers found a high level of attachment to the watch, with some users saying it felt like a pet -- even naming it, or putting their partner in charge of the feeding when they got sick.

via University of Chicago: Jasmine Lu et al, Integrating Living Organisms in Devices to Implement Care-based Interactions, The 35th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (2022). DOI: 10.1145/3526113.3545629

Image credit: It's not C elegans but it is a nematode (P pacificus) showing us its teeth. Because it has teeth. Everyday Nightmare Pictures - Nematode Teeth - P pacificus nematode showing its teeth - Jürgen Berger MPI for Biology - 2022

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Tuesday, February 28, 2023

Free Thermodynamic Lunch


There is a lot of extra energy lying around; you call almost call it free energy, and we are getting better at picking up all these scraps. And what are we doing with it? Making everything intelligent.

Battery-free, light-powered pacemaker may improve quality of life for heart disease patients
Oct 2022, phys.org

Wireless, battery-free pacemaker could be implanted with a less invasive procedure using a new digitally manufactured mesh design that encompasses the entire heart that works with optogenetics, which means it uses light instead of electrical signals. 

via Gutruf Lab at University of Arizona: Jokubas Ausra et al, Wireless, fully implantable cardiac stimulation and recording with on-device computation for closed-loop pacing and defibrillation, Science Advances (2022). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abq7469


High-performance and compact vibration energy harvester created for self-charging wearable devices
Nov 2022, phys.org

Microelectromechanical system piezoelectric vibration energy harvester that can amplify power generated from impulsive vibrations, such as from a human walking.

via  Osaka Metropolitan University: Sengsavang Aphayvong et al, Enhanced performance on piezoelectric MEMS vibration energy harvester by dynamic magnifier under impulsive force, Applied Physics Letters (2022). DOI: 10.1063/5.0116838


Harvesting big energy from small movement
Jan 2023, phys.org

It's made of alternating tiny fibers 100 times thinner than a human hair, one made of ethylene-vinyl acetate, and one of polylactic acid.

Wherever there is any movement around the layers of the fibers, electricity is generated from the friction between each layer.

"We can make around 400 times more electricity from motion than was previously possible from these materials."

via University of Melbourne: Artis Linarts et al, Electrospinning Triboelectric Laminates: A Pathway for Scaling Energy Harvesters, Small (2023). DOI: 10.1002/smll.202205563


Harvesting energy from moving trains
Jan 2023, phys.org

After several years of design review, CVeSS researchers created a new kind of tie that replaces the conventional wooden variety and is equipped to generate power. Their high-tech tie, placed underneath the rail, is topped with a heavy metal bar mounted on a spring creating electricity, which can then be stored in a battery.

"For every wheel of the train that goes by, we are harvesting 15 to 20 watts of power," said Ahmadian. "If we have a long train with maybe 200 railcars, that's 800 wheels, making 1.6 kilowatts. Once we have stored that energy, we are able to use it to make the tracks more intelligent by embedding sensors in them."

via Virginia Tech Center for Vehicle Systems and Safety and Railway Technologies Laboratory: Yu Pan et al, A half-wave electromagnetic energy-harvesting tie towards safe and intelligent rail transportation, Applied Energy (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2022.118844


Device transmits radio waves with almost no power—without violating the laws of physics
Jan 2023, phys.org via The Conversation

What we showed is that a powered signal source is not needed. Instead, random thermal noise, present in all electrically conductive materials because of the heat-driven motion of electrons, can take the place of the signal driving the antenna.

It seems like it violate the second law of thermodynamics. But the resolution of this seeming paradox is that the receiver in our system is powered and acts like a refrigerator. Nearly all of the power consumption happens at a base station that does not have constraints on energy use.

via University of Washington: Zerina Kapetanovic et al, Communication by means of modulated Johnson noise, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2201337119

Image credit: Kilonova Gamma Ray Burst GRB 211211A, artist impression. Aaron M Geller, Northwestern CIERA and IT Research Computing Services. 2022

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Friday, September 9, 2022

Quantum Update


Quantum physics in proteins - AI affords unprecedented insights into how biomolecules work
Nov 2021, phys.org

I hear the quantum biology headlines humming.

via Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron: Abbas Ourmazd, Few-fs resolution of a photoactive protein traversing a conical intersection, Nature (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04050-9



Physicists create compressible optical quantum gas
Mar 2022, phys.org

Calling BECs (Bose-Einstein Condensate) a "super photon" by the way.

via University of Bonn: Erik Busley et al, Compressibility and the equation of state of an optical quantum gas in a box, Science (2022). DOI: 10.1126/science.abm2543.


Physicists report on first programmable quantum sensor
Mar 2022, phys.org

"In the development of quantum computers, we have learned to create tailored entangled states." 
("Custom Quantum", am I right?)

via University of Innsbruck: Christian Marciniak, Optimal metrology with programmable quantum sensors, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04435-4.

Also: Quantum Variational Optimization of Ramsey Interferometry and Atomic Clocks, Physical Review X (2021). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevX.11.041045.


Chinese team breaks distance record for quantum secure direct communication
Apr 2022, phys.org

Distance of 102.2 km.
Prior to this new effort, the record was just 18 km.

via Tsinghua University in China: Haoran Zhang et al, Realization of quantum secure direct communication over 100 km fiber with time-bin and phase quantum states, Light: Science & Applications (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41377-022-00769-w

Tying Quantum Knots - TU Delft - 2022

It takes three to tangle: Long-range quantum entanglement needs three-way interaction
May 2022, phys.org

The researchers' findings are consistent with previous observations that long-range entanglement survives at a non-zero temperature only when more than three subsystems are involved.

via RIKEN: Tomotaka Kuwahara et al, Exponential Clustering of Bipartite Quantum Entanglement at Arbitrary Temperatures, Physical Review X (2022). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevX.12.021022


Tunable quantum traps for excitons
May 2022, phys.org

Physicists can now string together many such trapped excitons and adjust them in such a way that they emit photons having exactly the same properties. "That would allow one to create identical single photon sources for quantum information processing," 

via ETH Zurich: Deepankur Thureja et al, Electrically tunable quantum confinement of neutral excitons, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04634-z


Scientists use quantum computers to simulate quantum materials
May 2022, phys.org

"Computational Materials" sounds like another way of saying "active matter"?

Also "Hardware Noise":
Performing calculations of the properties of materials and molecules on quantum computers faces a problem that one does not experience with a classical computer, a phenomenon known as hardware noise. Noisy calculations return slightly different answers each time a calculation is performed; a noisy addition operation might return values slightly different from 4 each time for the question, "What is 2 plus 2?"

via Argonne National Laboratory's Midwest Integrated Center for Computational Materials and University of Chicago: Benchen Huang et al, Simulating the Electronic Structure of Spin Defects on Quantum Computers, PRX Quantum (2022). DOI: 10.1103/PRXQuantum.3.010339


Researchers achieve record entanglement of quantum memories
Jul 2022, phys.org

Again with the "quantum memories" term:
Researchers coupled two atomic quantum memories using two optically trapped rubidium atoms in two laboratories on the LMU campus connected via a 700-meter-long fiber optic cable.

via Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich: Tim van Leent et al, Entangling single atoms over 33 km telecom fibre, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04764-4


Scientists invent 'quantum flute' that can make particles of light move together
Jul 2022, phys.org

Ah yes, the quantum flute, we've been waiting for that one.

via University of Chicago: Srivatsan Chakram et al, Seamless High- Q Microwave Cavities for Multimode Circuit Quantum Electrodynamics, Physical Review Letters (2021). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.127.107701


Strange new phase of matter created in quantum computer acts like it has two time dimensions
Jul 2022, phys.org

First, the time thing:
By shining a laser pulse sequence inspired by the Fibonacci numbers at atoms inside a quantum computer, physicists have created a remarkable, never-before-seen phase of matter. The phase has the benefits of two time dimensions despite there still being only one singular flow of time, the physicists report July 20 in Nature.

Information stored in the phase is far more protected against errors than with alternative setups currently used in quantum computers. As a result, the information can exist without getting garbled for much longer, an important milestone for making quantum computing viable, says study lead author Philipp Dumitrescu.

The approach's use of an "extra" time dimension "is a completely different way of thinking about phases of matter."

Next, never seen this phrasing til now:
"stayed quantum"

via Simons Foundation: Philipp Dumitrescu, Dynamical topological phase realized in a trapped-ion quantum simulator, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04853-4


Researchers explore a new connection between topology and quantum entanglement
Aug 2022, phys.org

"Our work ties two big ideas together," says Charles Kane, the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Physics in Penn's School of Arts & Sciences. "It's a conceptual link between topology, which is a way of characterizing the universal features that quantum states have, and entanglement, which is a way in which quantum states can exhibit non-local correlations, where something that happens in one point in space is correlated with something that happens in another part in space. What we've found is a situation where those concepts are tightly intertwined."
The eureka, and one of the pandemic sort:
The seed for exploring this connection came during the long hours Kane spent in his home office during the pandemic, pondering new ideas. One train of thought had him envisioning the classic textbook image of the Fermi surface of copper, which represents the metal's potential electron energies. It's a picture every physics student sees, and one with which Kane was highly familiar.

"Of course, I learned about that picture back in the 1980s but had never thought about it as describing a topological surface," Kane says. ...

via University of Pennsylvania: Pok Man Tam et al, Topological Multipartite Entanglement in a Fermi Liquid, Physical Review X (2022). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevX.12.031022


Unexpected quantum effects in natural double-layer graphene
Aug 2022, phys.org

Again with the unexpected:
At temperatures just above absolute zero of minus 273.15 degrees Celsius, the electrons in the graphene can interact with each other—and a variety of complex quantum phases emerge completely unexpectedly. 

via University of Göttingen and University of Texas at Dallas: Anna M. Seiler et al, Quantum cascade of correlated phases in trigonally warped bilayer graphene, Nature (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04937-1


Post Script on the Sub- and Super-Luminal:
Listen to this guy Andrzej Dragan  talk about the "Quantum principle of relativity" at the Centrum Fizyki Teoretycznej, 2020-05-20

(the visuals come in at 19:40)

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