Phys.org July 7, 2022 To fully use entanglement over long-distance quantum network links it is mandatory to know it is available at the nodes before the entangled state decays. An international team of researchers (Austria, Germany) demonstrated entanglement between two independently trapped single rubidium atoms generated over fibre links with a length up to 33 km. They generated atom–photon entanglement in two nodes located in buildings 400 m line-of-sight apart and to overcome high-attenuation losses in the fibres converted the photons to telecom wavelength using polarization-preserving quantum frequency conversion. The long fibres guided the photons to a Bell-state measurement setup in which […]
Researchers create VX neurotoxin detector
Science Direct July 6, 2022 A team of researchers in the US (City College of New York, The State University of New Jersey, Clarkson University) designed a pair of VX-binding proteins using a supercharged scaffold that coupled a large-scale phase change from unstructured to folded upon ligand binding, enabling fully internal binding sites that present the maximum surface area possible for high affinity and specificity in target recognition. Binding site residues were chosen using a new distributed evolutionary algorithm implementation in protCAD. Both designs detected VX at parts per billion concentrations with high specificity. Computational design of fully buried molecular […]
Researchers find the missing photonic link to enable an all-silicon quantum internet
Phys.org July 13, 2022 The global quantum internet will require long-lived, telecommunications-band photon–matter interfaces manufactured at scale. Preliminary quantum networks based on photon–matter interfaces that meet a subset of these demands are encouraging efforts to identify new high-performance alternatives. Silicon is an ideal host for commercial-scale solid-state quantum technologies. It is already an advanced platform within the global integrated photonics and microelectronics industries, as well as host to record-setting long-lived spin qubits. Despite the overwhelming potential of the silicon quantum platform, the optical detection of individually addressable photon–spin interfaces in silicon have remained elusive. In their work researchers in Canada […]
A robot learns to imagine itself
Science Daily July 13, 2022 Internal computational models allow robots to consider outcomes of multiple possible future actions without trying them out in physical reality. Recent progress in fully data-driven self-modeling has enabled machines to learn their own forward kinematics directly from task-agnostic interaction data. However, forward kinematic models can only predict limited aspects of the morphology, such as the position of end effectors or velocity of joints and masses. A key challenge is to model the entire morphology and kinematics without prior knowledge of what aspects of the morphology will be relevant to future tasks. Researchers at Columbia University […]
Scientists Have Created an AI That Can Think Like a Human Baby
Science Alert July 11, 2022 Current artificial intelligence systems pale in their understanding of intuitive physics, in comparison to even very young children. An international team of researchers (USA – Princeton University, UK) addressed this gap between humans and machines by drawing on the field of developmental psychology. They introduced and open-sourced a machine-learning dataset designed to evaluate conceptual understanding of intuitive physics, adopting the violation-of-expectation (VoE) paradigm from developmental psychology. Then they built a deep-learning system that learns intuitive physics directly from visual data, inspired by studies of visual cognition in children. They demonstrated that their model could learn […]
Scientists invent ‘quantum flute’ that can make particles of light move together
Nanowerk July 7, 2022 Because of the combination of long coherence times and large interaction strengths, one of the leading experimental platforms for cavity QED involves coupling a superconducting circuit to a 3D microwave cavity. In this work. An international team of researchers (USA – University of Chicago, University Rutgers, University of Chicago, UC Berkeley, South Korea) demonstrated a variety of protocols for universal single-mode quantum control applicable across all cavity modes, using only a single drive line. They achieved this by developing a straightforward flute method for creating monolithic superconducting microwave cavities that reduces loss while simultaneously allowing control […]
US Begins Phase 1 Clinical Trial of Universal Flu Vaccine
Global Biodefense June 28, 2022 A team of researchers in the US (NIAID, industry) has demonstrated that an inactivated, multivalent whole virus vaccine, delivered intramuscularly or intranasally, is broadly protective against challenges with multiple IAV HA/NA subtypes in both mice and ferrets, including challenges with IAV subtypes not contained in the vaccine. This vaccine approach indicates the feasibility of eliciting broad “universal” IAV protection and identifies a promising candidate for influenza vaccine clinical development…read more. Open Access TECHNICAL ARTICLE
When light and electrons spin together
Phys.org July 12, 2022 An international team of researchers (Germany, Spain, USA – research organization) has demonstrated how the coupling between intense lasers, the motion of electrons, and their spin influences the emission of light on the ultrafast timescale. They demonstrated how changes in the electron velocity can affect the electron dynamics in Na3Bi and that this effect can sometimes be detrimental to the generation of high-order harmonics. While this material is non-magnetic, the team has shown that the spin of the electrons is important for the dynamics, as it couples to the potential felt by the electrons, which is […]
Top 10 Science and Technology Inventions for the Week of July 8, 2022
01. Physicists see electron whirlpools for the first time 02. Bacteria for blastoff: Using microbes to make supercharged new rocket fuel 03. Characterizing the materials for next-generation quantum computers with nonlinear optical spectroscopy 04. These energy-packed batteries work well in extreme cold and heat 05. Found: The ‘holy grail of catalysis’ turning methane into methanol under ambient conditions using light 06. A four-stroke engine for atoms 07. Hearing better with skin than ears 08. Laser writing may enable ‘electronic nose’ for multi-gas sensor 09. Magnetic spins that ‘freeze’ when heated: Nature in the wrong direction 10. Photon-controlled diode: An optoelectronic […]
Bacteria for blastoff: Using microbes to make supercharged new rocket fuel
Science Daily June 30, 2022 An international team of researchers (Denmark, USA – Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, UC Berkeley) explored the chemical diversity encoded in thousands of bacterial genomes to identify and repurpose naturally occurring cyclopropanated molecules. They identified a set of candidate iterative polyketide synthases (iPKSs) predicted to produce polycyclopropanated fatty acids (POP-FAs), expressed them in Streptomyces coelicolor, and produced POP-FAs. By determining the structure of the molecules, they were able increase their production 22-fold and produce polycyclopropanated fatty acid methyl esters (POP-FAMEs). Their research showed that the POP-FAMEs and other POPs […]