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Serge Haroch and David Wineland receive 2012 Nobel Prize in Physics

2012/10/09 Roa Zubia. Guillermo - Elhuyar Zientziaren Komunikazioa Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

Normally, mere observation modifies what is observed, especially in particle physics. The research of a photon involves acting in one way or another, so the result of the studied is questioned because it is a consequence of observation. But not always. The Frenchman Serge Haroche and the American David Wineland investigated photons and atoms without the observation itself destroying those photons. Hence the Nobel Prize in Physics 2012. Using the best-known metaphor of quantum physics, the two physicists have seen Schrödinger's cat without leaving the box.

Ed. Nobel Foundation

The example of Schrödinger's cat intended to question the consequences of quantum mechanics: by introducing a cat and a poison into a box, he is also given a radioactive mechanism that activates the poison. And according to quantum mechanics, the mechanism can be activated and disabled at the same time. The cat may be alive and dead at the same time. However, with the box open, the cat is dead or alive, one of them. Well, Haroch and Wineland, each on their side, invented methods to observe this peculiar state of the cat without opening the box.

The main difficulty of the experiments of Haroche and Wineland is that they experimented with individual photons, isolated light particles, studying the individual properties of photons, for which they had to be cleared and measured without interacting with anything else. They used two opposing strategies.

The light can be trapped for a while between the two mirrors. Haroch did, but with a single photon. The mirrors were made up of superconducting materials (the brightest mirrors in the world) and photons had a microwave frequency. Haroche's design held the photon for a tenth of a second, very long in the field of quantum optics, and sent Rydberg atoms into the trap. Rydberg atoms came out of the trap and reported the state of the photons without destroying the photon itself.

The Wineland experiment was a very concrete combination of lasers. It trapped the ion of an atom, creating electric fields around it. And he not only caught it, but isolated the inner trap from the outer conditions. Thus, the ion, like Schrödinger's cat, made it have two quantum states at once, and studied the overlap of states without altering the nature of the ion.

The experts stressed that in the future these investigations will have a great importance in the development of the quantum computer, using these techniques can be read simultaneously a qubit with values 0 and 1.

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Serge Haroch and David Wineland receive 2012 Nobel Prize in Physics

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