Time’s Arrow Traced to Quantum Source

Deja un comentario 20 mayo, 2020 institutoflash786

A new theory explains the seemingly irreversible arrow of time while yielding insights into entropy, quantum computers, black holes, and the past-future divide.

Coffee cools, buildings crumble, eggs break and stars fizzle out in a universe that seems destined to degrade into a state of uniform drabness known as thermal equilibrium. The astronomer-philosopher Sir Arthur Eddington in 1927 cited the gradual dispersal of energy as evidence of an irreversible “arrow of time.”

But to the bafflement of generations of physicists, the arrow of time does not seem to follow from the underlying laws of physics, which work the same going forward in time as in reverse. By those laws, it seemed that if someone knew the paths of all the particles in the universe and flipped them around, energy would accumulate rather than disperse: Tepid coffee would spontaneously heat up, buildings would rise from their rubble and sunlight would slink back into the sun.

Cientistas encontram universo multidimensional no cérebro

Deja un comentario 16 abril, 2020 institutoflash786

É um grande esforço de imaginação tentar compreender o mundo em quatro dimensões para muitas pessoas, mas um novo estudo descobriu estruturas no cérebro com até onze dimensões – trabalho inovador que está começando a revelar segredos profundos da arquitetura do cérebro.

Usando topologia algébrica de uma forma que nunca foi usada antes na neurociência, a equipe do Blue Brain Project descobriu um universo de estruturas geométricas multidimensionais e espaços dentro das redes do cérebro.

A pesquisa, publicada na Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience, mostra que essas estruturas emergem quando um grupo de neurônios formam uma panelinha: cada neurônio se conecta à todos os outros neurônios do grupo de uma forma muito específica, que gera um objeto geométrico preciso. Quanto mais neurônios há em uma panelinha, maior é a dimensão do objeto geométrico.

Physicists puzzled by strange numbers that could explain reality

Deja un comentario 13 marzo, 2020 institutoflash786

Eight-dimensional octonions may hold the clues to solve fundamental mysteries.

Paul Ratner30 December, 2018

Physicists discover complex numbers called octonions that work in 8 dimensions.
The numbers have been found linked to fundamental forces of reality.
Understanding octonions can lead to a new model of physics.

Is our reality, including its forces and particles, based on the strange properties of numbers with eight dimensions called “octonions“? A physicist thinks so, having found a way to expand 40-year-old research to reach surprising new directions.

First, a brief history of numbers.

Filmada por primera vez la observación cuántica

Deja un comentario 3 marzo, 2020 institutoflash786

La naturaleza duda antes de que el gato de Schrödinger aparezca vivo a muerto.

Los científicos han filmado lo que pasa cuando un observador se asoma al mundo cuántico: las dos probabilidades superpuestas dudan en el momento de elegir entre la vida y la muerte del gato, antes de que Schrödinger abra la caja.

Ion de estroncio atrapado en un campo eléctrico. La medición en el ion dura solo una millonésima de segundo… ¡y ha sido filmada! Crédito: F. Pokorny et al.

Un equipo de investigadores de Suecia, Alemania y España (Universidad de Sevilla) ha conseguido por primera vez filmar lo que pasa cuando un observador se asoma al mundo cuántico.

Es como decir, metafóricamente, que una cámara ha grabado el momento en el que Schrödinger destapa la caja y encuentra al gato vivo o muerto.

Según un ejemplo imaginado por el físico Erwin Schrödinger en 1935, si tenemos un gato dentro de una caja en la que hay alimento y veneno, el dueño del gato es el que decide su suerte al abrir la caja: estará vivo o muerto según lo que el observador quiera encontrar.

The universe may be conscious, say prominent scientists

Deja un comentario 5 febrero, 2020 institutoflash786

A proto-consciousness field theory could replace the theory of dark matter, one physicist states.

What consciousness is and where it emanates from has stymied great minds in societies across the globe since the dawn of speculation. In today’s world, it’s a realm tackled more and more by physicists, cognitive scientists, and neuroscientists. There are a few prevailing theories. The first is materialism. This is the notion that consciousness emanates from matter, in our case, by the firing of neurons inside the brain.

Take the brain out of the equation and consciousness doesn’t exist at all. Traditionally, scientists have been stalwart materialists. But doing so has caused them to slam up against the limitations of materialism. Consider the chasm between relativity and quantum mechanics, or Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, and you quickly start to recognize these incongruities.

The second theory is mind-body dualism. This is perhaps more often recognized in religion or spirituality. Here, consciousness is separate from matter. It is a part of another aspect of the individual, which in religious terms we might call the soul. Then there’s a third option which is gaining ground in some scientific circles, panpsychism. In this view, the entire universe is inhabited by consciousness.

Physicists puzzled by strange numbers that could explain reality

Deja un comentario 25 enero, 2020 institutoflash786

Eight-dimensional octonions may hold the clues to solve fundamental mysteries.

Physicists discover complex numbers called octonions that work in 8 dimensions.
The numbers have been found linked to fundamental forces of reality.
Understanding octonions can lead to a new model of physics.

First, a brief history of numbers.

There is no dark matter. Instead, information has mass, physicist says

Deja un comentario 22 enero, 2020 institutoflash786

Researchers have been trying for over 60 years to detect dark matter.
There are many theories about it, but none are supported by evidence.
The mass-energy-information equivalence principle combines several theories to offer an alternative to dark matter.

The “discovery” of dark matter

Physicists Finally Observe a Link Between Quantum Criticality And Entanglement

Deja un comentario 21 enero, 2020 institutoflash786

We know that the realm of quantum physics is science operating at a mind-bogglingly small scale, thus watching quantum interactions happen is always exciting. Now, physicists have managed to observe billions upon billions of entangled electrons passing through a metal film.

The film is a mix of ytterbium, rhodium and silicon, and is what’s known as a ‘strange metal’, one that doesn’t act as expected at very low temperatures.

“With strange metals, there is an unusual connection between electrical resistance and temperature,” explained physicist Silke Bühler-Paschen from Vienna University of Technology in Austria.

“In contrast to simple metals such as copper or gold, this does not seem to be due to the thermal movement of the atoms, but to quantum fluctuations at the absolute zero temperature.”

These fluctuations represent a quantum criticality – that point between quantum states which are the equivalent of transition between liquids, solids and gases in classical physics; the team says this cascade of electrons is the best evidence yet of a link between quantum criticality and entanglement.

The hunt for the ‘angel particle’ continues

Deja un comentario 17 enero, 2020 institutoflash786

A 2017 report of the discovery of a particular kind of Majorana fermion — the chiral Majorana fermion, referred to as the “angel particle” — is likely a false alarm, according to new research. Majorana fermions are enigmatic particles that act as their own antiparticle and were first hypothesized to exist in 1937. They are of immense interest to physicists because their unique properties could allow them to be used in the construction of a topological quantum computer.

A team of physicists at Penn State and the University of Wurzburg in Germany led by Cui-Zu Chang, an assistant professor of physics at Penn State studied over three dozen devices similar to the one used to produce the angel particle in the 2017 report. They found that the feature that was claimed to be the manifestation of the angel particle was unlikely to be induced by the existence of the angel particle. A paper describing the research appears on January 3, 2020 in the journal Science.

New theory of quantum mechanics shows matter is not in the eye of the observer

Deja un comentario 14 enero, 2020 institutoflash786

The measurement problems has plagued theoretical physics for nearly 100 years

The mystery of why quantum matter jumps from a wave-like state to a well-defined particle when it is observed has puzzled scientists for nearly a 100 years.

Known as ‘the measurement problem’ it is widely seen as the major complication in quantum theory and has led even well-respected scientists to suggest that the human mind may be having some kind of telepathic influence on the fabric of the universe – our thoughts actually shaping reality around us.

But physicist Jonathan Kerr, who has studied quantum mechanics for 35 years from his cottage in Surrey, believes he has solved the riddle, and the answer is more prosaic than some might have hoped.

He thinks that it is actually impossible to measure anything without a tiny interaction taking place and it is that ‘bump’ that tells the particle where it is in space and fixes its form.

Kerr, the nephew of the late author Judith Kerr, has just published a book on his theory and an article is due to appear in a well-respected peer reviewed journal soon. The idea was first posited by some scientists in the 1990s but it has been an unfinished until now.