Quantum physics

Infographic explaining the "Schrodinger's Cat" thought experiment. Illustration: depositphotos.com

Schrödinger's cat is heating up: A revolution in the concept of temperature in quantum physics

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Scientists have succeeded in producing quantum superposition states even at high temperatures, breaking the myth that only cold allows quantum phenomena to exist.
The metals region of the periodic table. Illustration: depositphotos.com

Quantum breakthrough could unlock the secret of strange metals – and the future of superconductors

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The strange metals are structurally close to high-temperature superconductors, which have the potential to conduct electricity without energy loss. Understanding them could revolutionize power grids and make energy transmission more efficient.
A green laboratory, two scientists researching optics, wearing lab coats with complex, computerized equipment.

Strong light and attoseconds: revolutionizing material properties using laser beams

Prof. Nirit Dudovich's lab reveals how strong light rapidly changes the properties of matter, breaking new ground for ultra-fast computing and communication capabilities.
Einstein's equation (E = mc^2) describes the relationship between mass and energy. Illustration: depositphotos.com

In honor of Albert Einstein's birthday: Light – waves or particles?

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From the chapter "The Year of Wonders" from Prof. Hanoch Gutfreund's book: Albert Einstein Creates a World Picture
Professor Erez Etzion. Photo: Tel Aviv University Spokesperson

Podcast: The Secrets of the CERN Particle Accelerator

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From the podcast series "Tel Aviv 360" (Hebrew)
Photo by research team: Tel Aviv University. Credit: Sayostudio

Electric memory slide

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A team of researchers from Tel Aviv University has succeeded in exploiting frictionless sliding to significantly improve the performance of memory components in computers and other electrical components.
The KM3NeT experiment uses an array of light sensor modules fixed to the floor of the Mediterranean Sea. This image shows the deployment process of one set of modules. Credit: INFN/A. Simonelli

The highest-energy neutrino to date was discovered in an underwater facility in the Mediterranean Sea.

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A still partially operational underwater neutrino detection experiment has detected what appears to be the highest-energy cosmic neutrino measured to date.
A tesseract (a four-dimensional cube) and the "shadow" it casts on a plane - the quasi-crystal discovered by Shechtman. According to Prof. Bartel, "The fact that a quasi-crystal is a "shadow" of a high-dimensional periodic crystal is not new in itself. We discovered that the casting is not only of but also of topological properties such as holes, distortions or vortices." Illustration: Florian Sterl, Sterltech Optics

Greetings from the Fourth Dimension: Technion Researchers Unveil New Breakthrough in the Field of Quasi-Crystals

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New research reveals that the fourth dimension dictates not only the structure but also the topological properties of quasicrystals, offering a deeper understanding of a phenomenon that won Prof. Dan Shechtman the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Leopold Infeld in a photograph from 1938. Public domain photo from Wikimedia

In Search of the Homeland: Leopold Infeld

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Leopold Infeld's life journey: from the Krakow ghetto through collaboration with Einstein to protests against anti-Semitism and censorship in Poland
A graphic showing the lateral motion of a quark (the green ball) inside a proton whose spin is aligned with its direction of motion (the big yellow arrow). Credit: Valerie Lentz, Brookhaven Lab.

Groundbreaking calculations reveal the hidden motion of quarks inside protons

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A new theoretical method enables more accurate calculations of the three-dimensional motion of quarks, and leads to a deeper understanding of the dynamics of the proton spin

The strange dance of ion and atom

A cold, strange and short molecule created in an experiment at the Weizmann Institute of Science following a collision between particles may shed light on chemical reactions at extremely low temperatures

Light alone cannot create a black hole

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Researchers from Canada and Spain have demonstrated for the first time that black holes cannot be formed from the compression of electromagnetic radiation alone. The reason for this lies in a quantum effect that converts energy into particles that scatter from the compressed area and prevent the light from collapsing
Comparison of the experimental measurement (above) and the theoretical simulation (below)

Scientists have discovered unexpected behavior in pairs of CO₂ molecules after ionization

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An international team of scientists has made a surprising discovery in the field of molecular physics, revealing unexpected symmetry breaking dynamics in carbon dioxide dimers after ionization. The study, published in Nature Communications, provides new insights on
The Xenon top array detector array of the XENONnT partnership. PR photo

The international XENONnT experiment: first measurement of nuclear recoil from solar neutrinos

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Prof. Rani Bodnik from the Department of Particle Physics and Astrophysics at the Weizmann Institute of Science is a partner in this research, and among other things built the control and calibration systems and took part in the data analysis
Simulation of a collision event corresponding to the formation of a Higgs pair measured in 2017. Credit: ATLAS/CERN collaboration

Physicists combine several observations of Higgs boson pairs and discover clues about the stability of the universe

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Remember how hard it was to find a single Higgs boson? Try to find two at the same place and time. This fascinating process, called Higgs pair production, can provide scientists with information about the self-interaction of
Finally the DOM experiment in the South Pole Telescope detector system is starting to give results. Credit: Mark Krasberg, IceCube/NSF

Bending reality: Einstein meets quantum mechanics in Antarctic ice

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Researchers examine the interface between these two theories, using ultra-high-energy neutrinos detected by a particle detector placed deep inside the Antarctic ice sheet at the South Pole
The Large Hadron Collider LHC is down for an upgrade. Photo: CERN

Why is the mass of the Higgs particle lighter than expected?

Researchers have built a model according to which the mass of the Higgs boson, which helps produce the mass of elementary particles, changed in the early universe, and is therefore much smaller than the standard model of particle physics describes
Photon Multiplier Tubes - A multiplier will detect flashes of energy produced when neutrinos interact with matter. Credit: Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

A huge facility in China will study the neutrino particles - mainly those generated from nuclear power plants

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The facility, named JUNO, consists of a huge tank that surrounds an array of detectors. The container contains a substance that causes a scintillation which is recorded in the detectors and thus allows to identify a neutrino event, its type and mass, since the neutrino particles change
A Stratasys printed materials experiment that will fly to the moon to examine the radiation environment there. PR photo

NASA will test Stratsys' printed components on the moon

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The purpose of the mission is to test the materials' resistance to radiation and the potential for the compatibility of printed parts in future space missions
Photo: Tel Aviv University spokesperson

Scientific discovery: researchers have seen phenomena from quantum mechanics in the movement of pendulums

The new system makes it possible to observe the phenomena that occur inside special "topological" materials by photographing the movement of pendulums using a normal camera
The three-body problem. The figure was prepared with the help of DALEE artificial intelligence software for illustration purposes only and should not be considered a scientific image

A breakthrough in predicting chaotic results in the three body system

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New research from the Larkach Institute of Physics reveals a significant advance in chaos theory, by confirming in detail the flux-based statistical theory that predicts chaotic outcomes in non-hierarchical Newtonian three-body systems. This breakthrough lies

Non-grieving anions observed for the first time - a new technology for quantum computing?

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The non-Abelian anions are quasi-particles with fascinating statistical and topological properties. Until recently, these particles were only theoretical, but now a research group from Harvard University has created them for the first time in the laboratory. The discovery is made
The interference experiment

A new radical theory unites Einstein's theories of gravity with quantum mechanics

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Two articles by University College London researchers have been published in Nature Communications and Physics Magazine in which the researchers offer an elegant way to reconcile the contradiction between the two theories, each of which affects on a different scale
Prof. Ado Kaminer in his laboratory. Photo: Nitzan Zohar, Technion Spokesperson

Towards the discovery of quantum phenomena that have not yet been observed: Prof. Ado Kaminer of the Technion won an ERC Consolidator grant

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"The observations will be made possible through the control we have developed over the wave nature of free electrons," explains Prof. Kaminer
From the left, Prof. Franz Krause, and Prof. Anne L'Ollier during the ceremony of receiving the Wolf Prize from the President of Israel Yitzhak Herzog. Photo courtesy of the Wolf Foundation

Nobel Prize in Physics for 2023 to researchers who managed to measure tiny and fast processes in electrons

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The 2023 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to three researchers: Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L'Huillier for "the development of their methods that produce short attosecond pulses
DALEE 2's interpretation of the matter of floating anti-matter atoms.

For the first time, the free fall of antihydrogen atoms was measured and the effect of gravity on antimatter was discovered

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"This is the first measurement ever made of the free fall of antimatter (antihydrogen) atoms that directly shows that they really fall down," explained Prof. Eli Sherid from the Physics Department at Ben-Gurion University
Crystal pump to generate quantum light for medical imaging devices. Photo courtesy of Shalom Schwartz

CAT scan for Schrödinger's cat

Quantum effects in X-rays make it possible to improve the resolution of the scan and protect the health of subjects and doctors
Laser in a physics lab. Illustration: depositphotos.com

A new method of creating quantum light sources will help in encryption and solving security problems

Prof. Adi Aryeh: "We are standing at the threshold of a new technological world, and with it comes a host of new opportunities alongside a host of problems we have not yet encountered."
Higgs boson. Illustration: depositphotos.com

Physicists have developed tools to discover unknown interactions between elementary particles. Are we on the way to a new physics?

Prof. Yael Shadami from the Faculty of Physics at the Technion focuses on the study of elementary particles including electrons, quarks, photons and gluons, and the interactions, or forces, that act between them. It tries to discover more elementary particles and interactions, beyond those described
"Scale of Polarizations"

electronic skips

Researchers have built surfaces from layers of atoms that slide over each other, thus causing the electrons inside to skip. In the future, they hope that it will be possible to develop advanced information technologies based on them

Three free lectures in honor of World Quantum Day on May 10

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On May 10, three lectures in the field of quantum will be delivered to the general public, zoomed and free of charge. The event is being held in honor of World Quantum Day under the auspices of the Center for Quantum Information at the Hebrew University. No need to register in advance.

For the first time: the experiment of the two cracks in the timeline

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In an article published in the magazine Nature Physics, a team of researchers from Britain, the USA, Germany and Australia demonstrated for the first time the two cracks experiment in the timeline. Instead of a spatial dispersion on a screen, the temporal crack created a dispersion in the light spectrum,

Will a muon accelerator save particle physics?

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In recent years, physicists from around the world have been discussing the construction of a muon accelerator instead of other conventional accelerators based on protons or electrons. Such an accelerator has clear advantages in discovering new physics, but its construction is accompanied by technological challenges
Premilab campus near Chicago. Photo courtesy of the Permilab National Laboratory

The largest particle accelerator in the US will undergo an upgrade and reopen after more than a decade of shutdown

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The upgrade is expected to last several years and will include the construction of a new building to house the upgraded accelerator. Permilab is also planning to build a new particle detector, which will be used to study the particles produced by the Tevatron.
Photomicrograph of superconducting (presumably) NLH. The model shown above has a diameter of one millimeter. credit: J. Adam Fenster/Univ. of Rochester

Thunderous silence following the claims of finding a conductor at room temperature

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Has a room temperature conductor finally been discovered? very doubtful The scientific community is suspicious of the reliability of the findings and the reason for this is clear, the researcher who signed the discovery claimed this in the past and was repelled by his colleagues on the claim
A sealed chip used to create a magnet-based informer. Photo: Prof. Ron Polman's laboratory, Ben Gurion University

to be in two places at the same time

Scientists are trying to answer one of the biggest open questions in physics

The advantage of entangled photons in material characterization

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Led by doctoral student Mamon Safdi and Professor Yaron Bromberg from the Hebrew University, an experiment was carried out that demonstrates for the first time a substantial advantage in characterizing materials using entangled photons over classical light. The experiment published in the prestigious journal Nature
Quantum communication satellite. Illustration: depositphotos.com

Tel Aviv University inaugurated the first satellite observatory for quantum optical communication

The observatory, one of the most advanced in the world, will be used for tracking, sensing, hyperspectral photography and optical and quantum communication with satellites in orbit around the Earth
Light with special chiral properties - a rotating field in the shape of the number 8. Courtesy of the researchers

An electron on the run

The scientists of the institute and their research partners showed that the chance of an electron to pass through a tunnel at the junction between a molecule and a light field, and the manner in which it will do so, depend to a large extent on the chirality of both the molecule and the light
The diagram simulates our algorithm for playing cards. The immediate effect of measuring one qubit on the others is similar to covert communication between players. Quantum computers use this effect to win the game with a higher probability compared to classical players. The diagram combines from left to right: 1) card game, 2) quantum circuit, 3) coin lottery (probability), 4) measurement of the qubits, 5) use of a classical algorithm that reduces the amount of noise, 6) analysis of the results. Design: Yael Barnea

Beats under influence

Researchers developed an algorithm that showed a basic quantum phenomenon: the immediate effect of one variable on other variables

First simulation of a wormhole on a quantum computer

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A team of researchers from Harvard University, MIT and Calcutta in collaboration with Google successfully simulated a traversable wormhole with the help of a quantum computer. The experiment performed on Google's quantum processor demonstrated a transition of

Invitation to an online lecture - all physics in one hour

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The lecture will be free. The date of the lecture will be announced, those interested are invited to register

Fundamental concepts in quantum physics: Bell's inequality - which was the basis of the Nobel Prize

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Inspired by the winners of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics, we will discuss Bell's theorem without introducing formulas and inequalities. In this article we will illustrate how experiments with entangled particles contradict the assumption that there are hidden variables and that quantum mechanics indeed
Quantum entanglement. From the explanation on the Nobel Prize website.

Nobel Prize in Physics for 2022 to three scientists in the field of quantum entanglement

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In the photo, from right to left: Prof. Avi Israeli, chairman of BSF; Minister of Innovation, Orit Farkash HaCohen; Director General of the Ministry of Innovation, Science and Technology, Hila Hadad Hamelnik. Photo credit: Shmulik Almani.

A first agreement of its kind in the field of quantum was signed between Israel and the USA

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During the visit of the Minister of Innovation, Orit Farkash HaCohen to the USA, she meets with senior officials and businessmen in order to strengthen the technological cooperation between the countries - after the Jerusalem Declaration. and collaborations
Hypothetical quantum waves. Image: depositphotos.com

There are many ways to the heart of quantum physics

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On Richard Feynman's alternative formalism for time-dependent quantum mechanics - and the classical approximations that make it convenient for implementation in physics and theoretical chemistry

The experiment that challenges dark energy

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A group of researchers from Nanjing University and the University of Science and Technology of China developed an experiment that tested a model for dark energy. The results of the experiment ruled out the model in question that predicted a fundamental fifth force in nature.
Scientific diagram: The journal Optica presents a new way to design an optical system to obtain the desired photonic entanglement - a collaboration between researchers from the Technion and Tel Aviv University. (credit SimplySci Animations)

A new way to create entangled photons

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Researchers from the Technion and Tel Aviv University have developed an innovative method to engineer quantum entanglement in a crystal, using computational learning tools
Consciousness at the molecular level. Image: depositphotos.com

The negated connection between quanta and consciousness

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A new article did an interesting experiment related to quantum theory and the study of consciousness. The results show that one of the well-known theories that claims that consciousness is created as a result of quantum measurement, is probably not true.
Gravitational waves

The breathing wave that proved a scientific theory