quantum entanglement...

Quantum entanglement theorists win Nobel Prize for loophole-busting experiments

After awarding three climate change modelers with the physics prize last year, the Nobel Committee recognized another trio of theorists in the field this year. Earlier today, it announced John. F Clauser, Alain Aspect, and Anton Zeilinger as the winners of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for their independent contributions to understanding quantum entanglement.

Quantum mechanics represents a relatively new arena of physics focused on the mysterious atomic and subatomic properties of particles. Much of the research dwells on individual conditions and reactions; however, some experts theorize that two or more, say, photons can share the same state while keeping their distance from each other. If so, an expert can analyze the first sample and assume what the second, third, or fourth ones might be like.

[Related: Nobel Prize in Medicine awarded to scientist who sequenced the Neanderthal genome.]

The phenomenon, called quantum entanglement, could hold answers to how energy flows through the universe and how information can travel over isolated networks. But some detractors wonder if the similarities in states are simply coincidental, or borne from other hard physics variables. Albert Einstein himself was skeptical of the explanation, calling it “spooky action at a distance” and a paradox in a letter to a colleague.

That’s where Clauser, Aspect, and Zeilinger come in. All three have designed experiments that address potential loopholes in the quantum entanglement theory, otherwise known as Bell inequalities. Clauser, an independent research physicist based in California, tested the polarization of photons emitted by lit-up calcium atoms with the help of a graduate student in 1972. His measurements matched those from previous physics formulas, but he worried that the way he produced the particles still left room for other correlations.

In response, French physicist Alain Aspect recreated the experiment in a way that detected the photons and their shared states much better. His results, the Nobel Committee stated, “closed an important loophole and provided a very clear result: quantum mechanics is correct and there are no hidden variables.”

[Related: NASA is launching a new quantum entanglement experiment in space.]

While Clauser and Aspect looked at entanglement in pure particle physics, Aspect expanded on it with the emerging fields of computation and encryption. The professor emeritus at the University of Vienna fired lasers at crystals to create mirroring photons, and held them at various measurements to compare their properties. He also tied in data from cosmic radiation to ensure that signals from outer space weren’t influencing the particles. His work set the stage for technology’s adoption of quantum mechanics, and has now been applied to transistors, satellites, optical fibers, and IBM computers.

The Institute of Science and Technology Austria issued a statement this morning congratulating Zeilinger, a former vice president in the group, and his fellow Nobel Prize recipients for their advancements. “It was the extraordinary work of Aspect, Clauser, and Zeilinger that translated the revolutionary theory of quantum physics into experiments,” they wrote. “Their demonstrations uncovered profound and mind-boggling properties of our natural world. Violations of the so-called Bell inequality continue to challenge our most profound intuitions about reality and causality. By exploring quantum states experimentally, driven only by curiosity, a range of new phenomena was discovered: quantum teleportation, many-particle and higher-order entanglements, and the technological prospects for quantum cryptography and quantum computation.”

Nobel Physics Prize goes to 3 quantum mechanics researchers

Wednesday, October 5th 2022 - 09:53 UTC

Quantum mechanics researchers from France, Austria, and the United States were awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics “for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell's inequalities and pioneering quantum information science,” it was announced in Stockholm by Sweden's Royal Academy of Sciences.

The jury found France's Alain Aspect, Austria's Anton Zeilinger, and John F. Clauser of the United States to be pioneers in their field for their experiments with quantum entangled states, in which two particles behave as a single unit even when separated. The results paved the way for a new technology based on quantum information.

“We can see that the laureates' work with entangled states is of great importance, even beyond the fundamental questions about the interpretation of quantum mechanics,” said Anders Irbäck, Chairman of the Nobel Committee for Physics.

The three prize-winning scientists worked on the so-called quantum entanglement, a state in which the fate of two particles is associated with each other and which intrigued Albert Einstein himself. Aspect, Clauser, and Zeilinger contributed with their research and experiments to solve the so-called Bell's Inequality.

Physicists wondered whether entangled particles owed their behavior to “hidden variables” that linked them. In the 1960s, John Stewart Bell postulated that, if these hidden variables existed, the correlation between the particles could not reach a certain limit. But that limit was eventually reached, thus demonstrating that the phenomenon of quantum entanglement went beyond the existence of hidden variables.

The three scientists split the 10 million Swedish kronor (US$ 882,000) prize equally, since their research has contributed in equal measure to perfecting experiments that have been instrumental in transforming quantum physics from an abstract discipline into a concrete tool for applications in the field of information, computation, and communications, it was explained.

Sleuths of 'spooky' quantum science win Nobel physics prize

Winners opened the way to powerful new quantum technologies

Findings enabled work on quantum computers, encryption

Winners' research is based on 'mind-boggling' insight

Zeilinger 'shocked but very positive' on hearing the news

Scientists shone light on behaviour of subatomic particles

STOCKHOLM, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Scientists Alain Aspect, John Clauser and Anton Zeilinger won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for experiments in quantum mechanics that laid the groundwork for rapidly-developing new applications in computing and cryptography.

"Their results have cleared the way for new technology based upon quantum information," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said of the laureates -- Aspect, who is French, Clauser, an American and Zeilinger, an Austrian.

The scientists all conducted experiments into quantum entanglement, where two particles are linked regardless of the space between them, a field that unsettled Albert Einstein himself, who once referred to it in a letter as "spooky action at a distance".

"I'm very happy ... I first started this work back in 1969 and I'm happy to still be alive to be able get the prize," Clauser, 79, told Reuters by phone from his home in Walnut Creek, California.

Clauser, who worked at institutions such as Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California, Berkeley, during his career, said he had witnessed his initial work snowball into much larger experiments.

China's Micius satellite, part of a quantum physics research project, was constructed in part on his findings, he said.

"The configuration of the satellite and the ground station is almost identical to my original experiment. Mine was about 30 feet long, theirs is thousands of kilometers for quantum communication."

Asked to explain his work in layman's terms, he joked he does not understand it himself but added that the interactions it describes permeate almost everything.

"Probably every particle in the universe is entangled with every other particle," Clauser said, chuckling.

NATURE OF REALITY

French President Emmanuel Macron tweeted his congratulations to the winners, adding "Einstein himself did not believe in quantum entanglement! Today, the promises of quantum computing are based on this phenomenon."

Aspect, professor at Universite Paris-Saclay and Ecole Polytechnique, Palaiseau, near Paris, said he was happy his work had contributed to settling the debate between Einstein, who was sceptical about quantum physics, and Niels Bohr, one of the field's fathers. Both won Nobel physics prizes.

"Quantum physics, which has been fantastic field that has been on the agenda for more than a century, still offers a lot of mysteries to discover," Aspect, 75, told reporters.

Secretary General of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Hans Ellegren, Eva Olsson and Thors Hans Hansson, members of the Nobel Committee for Physics announce the winners of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics Alain Aspect, John F. Clauser and Anton Zeilinger, during a news conference at The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm, Sweden, October 4, 2022. TT News Agency/ Jonas Ekstromervia REUTERS

"This prize today anticipates what will be one day be quantum technologies."

Zeilinger, 77, professor emeritus at the University of Vienna, told a news conference by phone after hearing the news that he was "shocked, but very positive."

In an interview after being awarded an honorary doctorate earlier this year, Zeilinger said that protected quantum communication over potentially thousands of kilometres via cables or satellite would soon be on the cards.

"It is quite clear that in the near future we will have quantum communication all over the world," he said at the time.

Quantum physics is the study of matter and energy at a subatomic level involving the smallest building blocks of nature, a realm governed by laws jarring with those of the classical Newtonian physics used in areas such as the motions of celestial objects.

In background material explaining the prize, the academy said the laureates' work involved "the mind-boggling insight that quantum mechanics allows a single quantum system to be divided up into parts that are separated from each other but which still act as a single unit."

"This goes against all the usual ideas about cause and effect and the nature of reality."

PRIZE 'LONG OVERDUE'

The laureates explored in ground-breaking experiments how two or more photons, or particles of light, that are "entangled" because they come from the same laser beam, interact even when they are separated far apart from each other.

Sean Carroll, Professor of Natural Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University and author of books on topics such as quantum mechanics, told Reuters the prize for the trio was long overdue.

"Even though the ... experimental techniques that these folks pioneered might not be directly applicable, they're laying the ground work for using quantum entanglement as a technological resource," he said.

The more than century-old prize, worth 10 million Swedish crowns ($902,315), is awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Physics is the second Nobel to be awarded this week after Swedish geneticist Svante Paabo won the prize for Physiology or Medicine on Monday.

The physics prize has often taken centre stage among the awards, featuring household names of science such as Einstein, Bohr and Max Planck, and rewarding breakthroughs that have reshaped how we see the world.

($1 = 11.0826 Swedish crowns)

Reporting by Niklas Pollard, Simon Johnson and Johan Ahlander in Stockholm, Jonathan Allen in New York and Ludwig Burger in Frankfurt; additional reporting by Terje Solsvik in Oslo, Anna Ringstrom in Stockholm, Geert De Clercq in Paris, and Marie Mannes in Gdansk; Editing by William Maclean and Nick Zieminski

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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