Dec 7, 2018 – Exploring quantum materials and black holes

Grounds for Science

 

with Arielle Little and Vinay Ramasesh

This event has been postponed until Friday, December 7

Friday, December 7, 2018 at 6:30 PM at Scarlet City Espresso Bar

The weird and wonderful world of Quantum Materials

Some of the most notable achievements in the study of materials have led to technological breakthroughs which have shaped modern society; take, for example the solid-state transistors which are the foundation for computation. But apart from useful applications, the study of the quantum mechanical properties of crystalline materials, or “hard condensed matter physics”, is in fact a rich playground for fundamental physics. In complex, strongly-interacting systems, exotic properties emerge which do not simply follow from the physical laws governing particles in a vacuum. A classic example is the phenomenon of superconductivity—which took scientists nearly 50 years to explain. In this talk, Arielle will try to convince you that condensed matter physics, on a fundamental level, is cool too.

Credit: Genevieve Martin / ORNL

Arielle Little

Arielle Little got hooked on physics research as a UC Berkeley undergrad while working on a large-scale experiment with the goal of trapping and measuring atomic antihydrogen. Now, as a graduate student in the Physics department, she works with smaller-scale experiments but on more complicated and messier physical systems. But really, she gets to play with lasers all day up at Lawrence Berkeley National lab. When not in the lab you can find her riding and racing bicycles all over California.

Exploring the physics of black holes with quantum computers

In recent years a connection has emerged between the physics of information in black holes and the theory of quantum error correction. We are beginning to realize the technology to explore this connection experimentally. In this talk, Vinay will describe a recent experiment being performed at his lab in UC Berkeley in this vein.

Credit: Marie Lu

Vinay Ramasesh

Vinay Ramasesh is a grad student at UC Berkeley working on realizing and optimizing small quantum processors, towards building a full-scale quantum computer.  Before coming to Berkeley, Vinay was an undergraduate student at MIT where he worked on cooling atoms with lasers.  When not working in the lab, Vinay enjoys playing music, frisbee, and tennis.

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