Scientists have succeeded in producing quantum superposition states even at high temperatures, breaking the myth that only cold allows quantum phenomena to exist.
Schrödinger's cat is a thought experiment written by Erving Schrödinger in 1935. Schrödinger proposed a scenario in which a cat is placed in a closed box along with a lethal mechanism that includes: a radioactive atom that may or may not decay within one hour (50% chance); a Geiger counter that detects the decay; and a hammer that will break a vial of deadly poison if the counter detects decay.
According to quantum mechanics, as long as the box is closed and unobserved, the atom is in a superposition – a state in which it has both decayed and not decayed at the same time. Since the state of the cat depends on the decay of the atom, the cat is also in a superposition: it is both alive and dead until someone opens the box and makes a measurement. At the moment of opening, the state “collapses” to one of the possibilities – the cat is alive or dead.
Scientists have achieved a groundbreaking quantum feat: they created "Schrodinger's cat" quantum states not from a cold, stable state, but from hot thermal states – thereby challenging one of the fundamental assumptions of quantum physics.
Using a superconducting qubit system, the researchers have demonstrated that quantum superposition can be maintained even at relatively high temperatures—an achievement that refutes the common belief that heat destroys quantum phenomena. Furthermore, this result revives Schrödinger's original idea—the "hot cat"—and opens the door to the development of more applicable quantum technologies.
Schrodinger's cat states are one of the strangest phenomena in quantum physics, in which a system can be in two opposite states at the same time. Originally a thought experiment, in which a cat is simultaneously alive and dead. Real-world experiments have demonstrated such states not on cats but on atoms, molecules, or electromagnetic resonances.
Until now, these states have been created by cooling the system to its lowest quantum state. But in a new study, led by Prof. Gerhard Kirchmeier and Prof. Uriel Romero-Isert, the researchers have shown that these states can also be created when the starting point is a hot, thermally unstable state.
"It's hard to forget that according to Schrödinger, the cat was alive – that is, warm," explains Kirchmeier from the Department of Experimental Physics at the University of Innsbruck and the Institute for Quantum Optics of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW). "We wanted to see if it was possible to produce quantum phenomena without starting from the cold state."
Creating a superposition at high temperatures
The study, published April 4 in the journal Science Advances , was performed using a transmon qubit inside a microwave resonator, and was done at temperatures up to 1.8 Kelvin – 60 times the normal temperature of the resonator.
"We were able to produce extremely entangled quantum states, while still preserving distinct quantum properties," says Yan Yang, who performed the experiments.
The researchers used two protocols that had previously only been used for cold conditions. After adaptation, they found that significant quantum interference could be produced even at high temperatures.
Prof. Uriel Romero-Isert, until recently a theoretical physicist in Innsbruck and currently director of ICFO – the Institute for Photonic Sciences in Barcelona, notes:
"This achievement opens up new opportunities in the use of quantum superpositions, especially in areas such as nanomechanical oscillators – where it is very difficult to reach the cold state."
When heat doesn't interfere with quantum
“We have always assumed that high temperature destroys quantum phenomena,” adds Thomas Agranius, who contributed to the theoretical understanding of the study. “But our measurements show that this is not necessarily the case – the quantum entanglements are preserved.”
According to Kirchmeier, "If we succeed in creating the necessary interactions within the system, temperature may no longer be a barrier to developing new quantum technologies."
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If the world were stable, we would presumably have reached a static state billions of years ago or never have left the static state at all.
Avi, edit your article. It is incomprehensible. Although I do not understand physics at all. I have never studied physics and all my knowledge is from reading occasional articles. But I still understand that the article is not written in a way that explains what the research is about, other than the cat's resurrection even at a higher temperature. In the original article, Schrödinger was the example and here is the main point. In any case, as someone who thinks he understood what was written in the original article, here are my main conclusions from the article, that quantum entanglement can also occur at a higher temperature than was thought to exist. The qubit is the state of entanglement and entanglement can only exist in superconductors where the free electrons in a state of very low temperature, close to absolute zero, can create a quantum entanglement of two free electrons. The experiment found that it is possible to create quantum entanglement that will maintain itself even at a higher temperature than absolute zero, a temperature that is very difficult to achieve and requires a lot of energy to extract the energy present in the system to create the entanglement. Quantum entanglement is a state in which two free electrons are achieved with the help of superconductors, in which the free electrons are "freer" and are present in greater quantities. Entanglement is a state of "telepathic" connection between two electrons that, as soon as a third party intended to understand the state of one of them, the telepathic connection was broken. And this state of telepathy between two electrons can only be achieved at a temperature close to absolute zero. And a study done in the original article found that it is also possible at a higher temperature. I have no knowledge of physics, so what I wrote is only from a random reading and it is possible that I did not understand what entanglement is, but according to what you wrote and what is written in the original article, your explanation is not understandable and does not teach anything. It is written in a way that a person from the village would not understand anything. And I'm a person from the settlement and I came in out of curiosity and you confused me.