PSW 2454 Quantum Steampunk | Nicole Yunger Halpern

Показать описание

Lecture Starts at 13:28
PSW #2454
February 25, 2022
Quantum Steampunk: Victorian thermodynamics meets quantum computing
Nicole Yunger Halpern
Fellow
Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science
University of Maryland

The Industrial Revolution lit the spark of thermodynamics, the study of energy. Since it was first formulated, just before the Philosophical Society of Washington was founded (1871) the science of thermodynamics has shed light on engines, efficiency, and the arrow of time. The steam engines that power factories, consisting of many particles, are well-approximated by the classical physics as codified by Isaac Newton. However, much of today’s technology and experiments are small-scale and eschew classical mechanics. For instance, quantum systems consist of few electrons, atoms, or other particles. Quantum physics is being leveraged to build computers that will outstrip even today’s supercomputers in solving certain problems.

Analogous to computational tasks in information science are energy-processing tasks in thermodynamics. Examples include the powering of engines, the charging of batteries, and refrigeration. Can quantum physics benefit thermodynamic tasks as it benefits computational tasks? How would a quantum engine look? Does the nature of heat change at the quantum scale? Twenty-first-century science calls for a re-envisioning of 19th-century thermodynamics. I will discuss how researchers are modernizing thermodynamics using the theoretical framework behind quantum computing. I call this program quantum steampunk, after the steampunk genre of literature, art, and cinema in which futuristic technologies populate Victorian-era settings. This lecture will discuss the quantum steampunk development of quantum thermodynamics.

Nicole Yunger Halpern is a Fellow of the Joint Institute for Quantum Information and Computer Science, a theoretical physicist at the National Institute of Science and Technology, and an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland. Previously she was a postdoctoral fellow in Physics at Harvard University.

Her primary research focus is to reformulate classical thermodynamics developed in the 19th century using quantum physics. She has dubbed this research “quantum steampunk,” after the steampunk genre of art and literature in which Victorian settings are juxtaposed with futuristic technologies.

Nicole has written 34 papers coauthored with over 60 collaborators and she has presented over 100 invited talks. She also is the author of the book “Quantum Steampunk: The Physics of Yesterday’s Tomorrow”, which New Scientist called one of “the best science books coming your way in 2022.” In addition, she has written over 100 articles for the blog Quantum Frontiers, and numerous articles and poetry for Scientific American, the Mathematical Intelligencer, and other publications.

Among other honors and awards, Nicole’s doctoral dissertation won the international Ilya Prigogine Prize and she was awarded the International Quantum Technology Emerging Researcher Award as a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University.

Nicole earned a BS at Dartmouth College, where she was co-valedictorian of her class; an MS at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and a PhD in Physics at CalTech (the California Institute of Technology).