BarBQ is the open networking of Berlin Quantum: open to all quantum enthusiasts to join us at Leap Quantum tech Hub to talk about quantum and enjoy! This special edition commemorates the World Quantum Day (14th April). A motivational talk about this particular day, drinks, and snacks will be provided.
The Quantum Coalition and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) proudly present the Future Leaders in Quantum (FLIQ) Virtual Hackathon, a global challenge designed to empower the next generation of quantum innovators.
As part of the UN International Year of Quantum (IYQ), FLIQ brings together students, mentors, and industry leaders from across the world to collaborate, compete, and create real-world quantum solutions. Whether you’re a technical problem solver, an aspiring quantum entrepreneur, or a creative storyteller, FLIQ is designed to be accessible, inclusive, and impactful helping you take your first (or next) step into the quantum world.
Faculty Lecture: Quantum Mechanics and Pure Mathematics
As part of the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology 2025 (IYQST2025), Nelson Mandela University Faculty of Science will host a faculty lecture on 11 April 2025, delivered by Dr. Martin Weigt from the Department of Mathematics.
The lecture will explore the historical and theoretical developments of quantum mechanics, focusing on Heisenberg’s matrix mechanics (1925) and Schrödinger’s wave mechanics (1926), and their influence on pure mathematics.
Dr. Weigt will also discuss quantum mechanics’ role in modern physics, including its connection to the quantum theory of gravity.
The Quantum Device Workshop is designed to teach advanced undergraduates and graduate students the art of designing quantum devices. This year, we aim to have a 4-day hands-on workshop on how to effectively design superconducting qubits.
We will cover basic theory and simulation techniques, best practices, and general constraints for designing superconducting devices. We will offer a beginner track and an advanced track so that people of all different skill levels can gain something from this event.
There will be an in-person registration for the lectures and workshop sessions. Attendants can also register for an online-only session for the lectures.
Recent developments in low-temperature detectors incorporate genuine quantum features, promising to reach unprecedented levels of measurement precision. On a fundamental level, these highly sensitive devices will give us a glimpse into the world of quantum/thermal fluctuations and the effect of measurement backaction, and will advance the utilization of quantum resources and feedback. They will create a pathway to scientific breakthroughs: novel phenomena in condensed-matter physics, enhanced spectroscopical characterization, observation of new particles, and understanding of the interaction between gravity and quantum-mechanical objects.
Interestingly, if you ask this question to different scientists, you will likely get different answers. There are some connections between the different answers, but it will be easiest to start by just looking at one answer you might frequently get: One of the first uses of the word quantum in the quantum science context is in the phrase “light quanta,” the idea that there is something countable about light. This phrase is most easily understood in terms of the energy that light carries from one place to another.
Yes, exactly. The energy in the light comes from the sun, travels millions of kilometers through space, and hits your skin, warming it up. The longer you stand in the sunlight, the more energy your skin absorbs. In principle, this transfer of energy from the light to your skin could be continuous. Indeed, before quantum science, the generally accepted theory among scientists was that light energy could be continually transferred in any amount. But it turns out, this light energy is only transferred in tiny quanta – little pieces of energy. The common name of these light quanta you may already have heard, they’re called “photons.”
Not individually, they’re so small that they’re imperceptible to us. However, we can now, thanks to our understanding of quantum mechanics, create instruments that do detect and count individual photons. As an analogy to understanding why you can’t feel individual photons, instead of thinking about light hitting your skin, think about water hitting it. If you put your hand under a running faucet or in a stream, you would feel water continually flowing, but if you go out in the rain, you would feel water hitting you in drops that are countable.
It would be! The point is not whether we can actually find the number, but whether there is something we can count at all. In this case, a quantum of sand is a grain of sand. But now let me ask a trickier question, if we were on the beach and looked out at the water and I said, “count the water” what do I mean?
Yes, this would be challenging! Again, the point is not whether a person can actually calculate the correct number; it’s whether there is anything meaningful to count at all. Now if the raindrops became smaller and smaller and came faster and faster, eventually you would no longer be able to perceive that the water hitting you came in individual drops, it would start to seem like the continuous flow of water you perceive when you put your hand under a faucet or in a stream. The fact that there are countable drops would be hidden from your perception.
It’s a similar situation in that the discrete, countable nature of the pictures is hidden. When you’re watching a movie, it doesn’t seem like there is anything to count in the motion you’re seeing. In the same way, the rain with very small drops might seem like a continuous flow of water and the sunlight energy warming your skin doesn’t appear to have anything countable about it. These quanta of sunlight energy are very well hidden from our usual perception of the world. This is kind of a hallmark of quantum science – finding out that things that don’t seem to have anything countable about them do, in fact, have a countable “quantum” aspect to them.
No. In the same way that raindrops or grains of sand can come in different sizes, the photon energies can have different sizes. However, there is a very nice fact about photon size related to the fact that any light can be thought of as being made up of a combination of different colors of light.
Exactly, or like a rainbow, which you can see when sunlight is broken up into its constituent colors by raindrops. So, it turns out that each specific color of light has its own size of photons. All red light of a particular type – more technically of a particular wavelength or frequency – transmits energy in quanta of the same size. Similarly, all blue light of a particular type has energy quanta of the same size. Photons of blue light are larger than photons of red light, and photons of yellow light are bigger than red light but smaller than blue light. The order of colors of a rainbow from red to violet gives the size of photons from smallest to largest.
In fact, in addition to the visible colors, sunlight also contains light that we can’t see with our eyes. One type of this light is “ultraviolet” or UV light. This light actually has larger energy photons than the visible light. The size of these photons is quite relevant to us because when they hit our skin, they can do the most damage to it biologically; it’s the large photons of UV light that cause sunburns and can increase one’s chance of getting skin cancer.
That will depend somewhat on the person and the light, but an average person standing in the sun is going to have around one billion trillion photons hit their skin each second. That’s a one with 21 zeros: 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 each second.
It’s a number you can write down, but certainly couldn’t count to! It is a fascinating aspect to understand about the common experience of standing in sunlight that no one knew existed until the advent of quantum science. It’s something to ponder next time you’re being warmed by the sun.
Written by Paul Cadden-Zimansky, Associate Professor of Physics at Bard College and a Global Coordinator of IYQ.
IYQ mascot, Quinnie, was created by Jorge Cham, aka PHD Comics, in collaboration with Physics Magazine.
All rights reserved.
🔬 We invite schoolchildren to interactive “Principles of Uncertainty in the World” classes, which will be held from March 24 to 28, 2025!
📌 What awaits you?
🔹 Offline classes (from 11:00 to 14:00) – exciting demonstrations, master classes, and scientific experiments in a safe space. You will be able to not only observe but also participate in experiments!
🔹 Online quizzes Kahoot! (from 14:00 to 18:00) – test your knowledge and compete for the title of the smartest!
📍 Where will the events take place?
✅ Offline classes – in a specially prepared location in a shelter in Kharkiv, Ukraine.
✅ Online quizzes – in a convenient format from any device.
🔎 For whom?
This is for schoolchildren interested in science, experiments, and the mysteries of the universe!
Conference for high school students on quantum mechanics and its applications. Organized by the Sezze (LT) municipality and by the High School “Pacifici De Magistris,” Sezze, Italy. ” Speaker: Dr. Fabio Chiarello, Senior Researcher of the Istituto di Fotonica e Nanotecnologie, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR-IFN).
The Africa Quantum Consortium (AQC) invites you to the Quantum Roundtable, a quarterly event fostering insightful discussions, impactful networking, and collaborative opportunities within Africa’s quantum landscape. Join experts and leaders to drive advancements that benefit our continent and the global community.
The conference features exciting advances in artificial intelligence (AI) in quantum sciences. The program covers frontier topics in quantum many-body physics, quantum information, materials science, and the physics of machine learning.