Superposition, Entanglement, and Raising Schrödinger’s Cat
In 1935, Erwin Schrödinger, one of the inventors of quantum mechanics, illustrated his discomfort with the theory by pointing out that its extension to the macroscopic world could lead to bizarre situations such as a cat being simultaneously alive a....
More details | Watch nowControlling Photons in a Box and Exploring the Quantum to Classical Boundary
The founders of quantum theory assumed in 'thought experiments' that they were manipulating isolated quantum systems, obeying the counterintuitive laws which they had just discovered. Technological advances have recently turned these virtual experi....
More details | Watch nowThe Quantum Mechanics of Light: Interference, Entanglement – and Ghosts
The early days of the quantum theory presented many dilemmas connected with interference phenomena and what we have come to call the entanglement of states. We are much better able to deal with these problems now, both in theory and experiment, but t....
More details | Watch nowA Century of Quantum Mechanics
In October 2011 we celebrated the centenary of the Solvay conferences that played a unique and important role in the development of twentieth century physics, most notably in the quantum revolution whose birth overlapped the initiation of these meeti....
More details | Watch nowCreating Artificial Magnetic Fields to Act on Neutral Atoms
Cold, quantum degenerate gases of neutral atoms have proved to be useful in simulating the behavior of quantum systems like electrons in solids. For example, cold atoms moving in optical lattices (periodic potentials created by interfering laser be....
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