Curious About Quantum Physics?

Read These 10 Articles!

BY STEVE MARIOTTI

I've been fascinated by quantum physics since I was five. I have even written here about my
enchantment with Bell's Theorem (see the article here). My mother brought me over to the large
oak table in our home in Ann Arbor, Michigan. On it, she had spread out some papers by Erwin
Schrdinger, the Nobel-Prize winning Austrian physicist responsible for some of quantum
theory's core principles.

The brilliant physicist John Bell (source)
"This is the intellectual tradition you come from," my mother declared, "all the top quantum
physicists used to come to Ann Arbor every summer to attend the Summer School in Theoretical
Physics."
"Why don't they come anymore?" I asked.
"Because they developed a bomb which killed hundreds of thousands of people in Japan at the
end of World War II. After that Ann Arbor refused to have anything to do with quantum physics
for many years," she replied.
I was shocked. A bomb had been developed in our hometown that had killed so many people so
far away?
"It's your duty to do whatever you can to prevent nuclear war," she added sternly.
I didn't fully grasp all she had said, but I nodded somberly.
What I took away from this conversation with my brilliant mother--who was a beloved special
education teacher in Michigan for thirty years--is the same thing I hope you will consider: It's
important for every citizen to have a basic understanding of quantum physics so we can all help
prevent nuclear war, and so we also understand the fantastic benefits this remarkable discipline
has to offer humanity.
Quantum physics (also called quantum theory and quantum mechanics) studies the behavior of
matter at the nanoscopic level. It looks at how atomic and subatomic particles behave. What
quantum physicists discovered is that in this super-tiny world, Newton's laws of physics no
longer apply.
In Isaac Newton's physics all matter was perceived as "continuous." In other words, a rock was
smoothly and consistently a rock all the way through. Quantum physicists discovered that
matter is actually made up of nanoscopically small "lumps." They noticed that light is not
actually absorbed by matter in a smooth continuous fashion, but rather in segments. It's as if
you're driving down the freeway but you can only accelerate in multiples of 10 miles an hour, as
physicist James Kakalios explains in his wonderful book The Amazing Story of Quantum
Mechanics.

Quantum physicists have observed fascinating behavior on this level that has revolutionized our
understanding of our world and led to new technologies we use every day. Without quantum
mechanics there would be no personal computers, no lasers, no CDs or Blu-ray players!
If you want a mostly math-free exploration of quantum physics, I highly recommend Kakalios's
book. But if you're eager to challenge yourself and delve into the subject, I recommended you
read my favorite 10 physics articles.

Author at ISAW with a few of these papers (source: Ricardo Andres)
Here are the first five. Stay tuned for Part II of this article, which will list the next five!
1. "On the Law of Energy Distribution in the Normal Spectrum" (Annalen der Physik, 1901) by
Max Planck. Planck was a German theoretical physicist who originated quantum theory. He won
the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. This article revolutionized human understanding of how
atoms and subatomic particles behave.

Planck at center with other Nobel Prize winners (source).
2. "On the Motion of Small Particles Suspended in a Stationary Liquid, as Required by the
Molecular Kinetic Theory of Heat" (Annalen der Physik, 1905) by Albert Einstein. In this paper,
Einstein explained how Brownian motion occurs. Brownian motion was named for botanist
Robert Brown, who noticed through his microscope in 1827 that pollen particles in water were
randomly moving. He couldn't figure it out, but Einstein theorized that this motion results from
the collision of the particles with the atoms that comprise the liquid. Einstein developed a
mathematical model called "particle theory" to describe these random movements. Brownian
motion was verified experimentally by Jean Perrin in 1908, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics
in 1926.
3. "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" (Annalen der Physik, 1905) by Einstein. Also
written during Einstein's Annus Mirabilis or "miracle year," 1905, when he published four
genius works that laid the theoretical foundation of quantum physics. In this paper, Einstein
detailed his theory of special relativity, which enabled scientists to better understand movement
at the speed of light. It remains the most accurate model we have for motion because it replaced
the idea that time and space could be defined separately with the new idea--since verified by
experiments--that they are interdependent on a space-time continuum.

Einstein at his office in 1920 (source).
4. "Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?" (Annalen der Physick, 1905)
by Einstein. Here, Einstein lays out the world's most famous equation:E = mc2 . He explains
that mass (m) and kinetic energy (E) are equal, because the speed of light (c2) is constant. In
other words, mass can be changed into energy and energy can be changed into mass. This is how
nuclear energy is produced by nuclear fission. The nuclei of atoms (uranium atoms, typically)
are split by shooting neutrons at them, and this destruction of their mass releases energy.

Planck and Einstein (source).
5. In 1912, Einstein produced his General Theory of Relativity. Reading this paper requires first-
year calculus and physics, but it's worth a look simply because it's so incredibly important. In it,
Einstein proved Newton's concept of space and time as absolute realities measurable by fixed
parameters was false. These parameters are actually perceptions and are, therefore, dependent
upon (or relative to) whoever is doing the perceiving.
These pioneering papers have led directly to such discoveries as black holes and, of course,
nuclear weapons and energy--and we've only scratched the surface.
Happy reading!
Ever hear the one about the cat that was simultaneously dead and alive?
In 1935, Austrian quantum physicist Erwin Schrdinger devised a hypothetical experiment, in
which a cat is placed in a sealed box with a radioactive sample, a Geiger counter and a bottle of
poison. The Geiger counter is set to trigger the smashing of the bottle of poison if the radioactive
material decays--which will kill the cat.
Schrdinger was out to illustrate the flaws in the "Copenhagen interpretation" of quantum
mechanics, which argued that a particle exists in all its potential states at once until it is
observed.

Schrdinger's Cat (source)
As Schrdinger cleverly pointed out, the Copenhagen interpretation would imply that the
radioactive material would simultaneously decay and not decay in its sealed, unobserved
environment. Which would mean the cat would be both alive and dead until the box is opened.
Since that's not possible, Schrdinger wrote that his hypothetical experiment"prevents us from
so naively accepting as valid a 'blurred model' for representing reality."
That's what I love about quantum physicists--they explore the deepest nature of reality--and
discover such fascinating things. In Part 1 of this two-part series (click here), I recommended
five of my ten favorite physics articles.
Here are the next five!
6. "On the Perceptual Content of Quantum Theoretical Kinematics and Mechanics" byWerner
Heisenberg (1927) articulates the German physicist's famous "uncertainty principle," which
Schrdinger sought to debunk with his alive/dead cat. Heisenberg argued that you could never
know the exact position and velocity of an object because you would never truly know where the
object had been. This lead to the idea that the "jolt" provided to a subatomic particle by
observing it could affect it.

Werner Heisenberg and Paul Dirac (source)
Schrdinger and later Einstein debunked that "observation principle", but modern physicists
have confirmed that Heisenberg was onto something. His uncertainty principle was true. If you
bounce a photon off an electron to try to measure it, the electron's path is changed by the
momentum of the photon that just hit it.
This "uncertainty" explains lots of natural phenomena, including why our sun shines. In the
sun's center, protons collide with each other - sometimes they fuse and release energy in the
form of heat and light. The temperatures at the sun's center are not high enough for the protons
to gain enough energy to escape, according to classical physics. Luckily, thanks to the
uncertainty principle, they do gather up enough bits of energy to burst out and provide us with
sunshine.
7. "The Fundamental Equations of Quantum Mechanics," was written by then-PhD candidate
Paul Dirac in 1925. A friend had sent Dirac Heisenberg's paper and the brilliant young physicist
was drawn to a mysterious mathematical relationship that Heisenberg had reached. Tackling it
led Dirac to develop his own quantum theory, and at 31 he became the youngest person to
receive the Nobel Prize in Physics. With a personality rather like Mr. Spock, Dirac was known
for both his long bouts of silence and his love of pure logic. In 1928, he predicted the existence of
antimatter based on his equations.
In fact, I love Dirac's work so much I am writing separate article--coming soon!

Dirac, Heisenberg, and Schrdinger, en route to pick up Nobel Prizes (source)
8. "The Present Situation in Quantum Mechanics" by Erwin Schrdinger (1935). After lots of
correspondence with Albert Einstein, Schrdinger proposed his cat experiment in this legendary
paper. Although the uncertainty principle he sought to debunk survived, "Schrdinger's Cat"
remains an important thought experiment for modern physicists, who still use it to test their
theories. It also made for a terrific Google Doodle on Schrdinger's 126th birthday, Aug 12,
2013.
9. "Can Quantum-Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?" Albert
Einstein asked in this classic paper he published in 1935 while residing at 112 Mercer Street in
my beloved Princeton. In this paper, Einstein and his colleagues Boris Podolsky and Nathan
Rosen (known collectively as EPR) described the phenomenon now known as quantum
entanglement. It explains why a hot cup of coffee cools down over time, but a tepid cup of coffee
doesn't heat up. (Very!) basically, the heat energy in the coffee disperses over time as coffee and
air particles bounce around and interact with each other--eventually the coffee particles lose
energy and the coffee cools down until it reaches the same temperature as the air particles in the
room.

Einstein on his porch at 112 Mercer Street in Princeton (source)
10. "On the Einstein Podolsky Rosen Paradox," published in 1964, was Irish physicistJohn
Stewart Bell's response to EPR. Written during a weekend Bell spent on the Isle of Shoals in
New Hampshire, it may be the greatest scientific paper of all time. In it, he proposed Bell's
Interconnectedness Theorem, a "no-go theorem," meaning a theorem that states that a
particular situation is not physically possible.
Specifically, Bell's theorem tests whether or not particles connected through quantum
entanglement (like our coffee and air) communicate information faster than the speed of light.
Experiments have since shown that our universe has a property called "non-locality." In other
words, two particles can be light years apart, yet are linked to each other instantaneously. How
instantaneously? Recent measurements have shown that they communicate at 10,000 times the
speed of light!
Finally, it was a personal thrill of mine recently to have lunch with Dirac's finest biographer,
Graham Farmelo, at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton. I can't recommend his
2009 book The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom enough!
We met at Princeton during a conference on String Theory, another way to think about quantum
physics, taking into account gravity. String Theory is in flux, as geniuses around the world try to
understand our universe. And, I myself haven't mastered my own understanding of this science!

The author and David Gross, Nobel Prize winner in String Theory at Princeton this summer
(source: Ricardo Andres)
About thirty years old today, String Theory was created when a scientist namedGabriele
Veneziano created his own theory of dual resonance--leading many physicists to look at the
world, the universe as vibrating, resonating strings. As I begin to strengthen my own knowledge
on the subject, I will post more and more!