Joint OSE Seminar and Physics Colloquium by Dr. Konrad Lehnert on The sound of quantum mechanics
Departmental News
Posted: September 30, 2019
Date: Friday, October 4, 2019
Time: 3:30 PM to 4:30 PM
Location: Dane Smith Hall, Room 125
Speaker:
Dr. Konrad Lehnert of JILA
Abstract:
Quantum information science promises to transform the way we calculate, measure, and communicate. The quantum technologies that make this possible have arisen through relentless improvement in our ability to control and measurement atomic, optical, or electrical systems. In this talk, I will describe how this quantum control can now be extended into the mechanical and acoustical domain. This new science of quantum sound arose without any specific application in mind but rather from curiosity about how sensitively we could control and detect the motion of micromechanical oscillators. But unlike electrical and optical systems, which are governed by fundamental equations of electromagnetism, acoustical phenomena are described by the equations of elastic waves in solid bodies. They are subject to different limitations and can reach different regimes of behavior. These facts have consequences for quantum information sciences that we have yet to fully understand. Nevertheless, I will describe a few notions about how the quantum control of sound may be useful.
