Quantum points of interest

• Grant number: 22/14210-6
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: March 01, 2023
• End date: August 31, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Physics
• Agreement: University of Exeter
• Mobility Program: SPRINT - Projetos de pesquisa - Mobilidade
• Principal Investigator: Celso Jorge Villas-Bôas
• Grantee: Celso Jorge Villas-Bôas
• Principal researcher abroad: Charles Andrew Downing
• Institution abroad: University of Exeter, Exeter, England
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Exatas e de Tecnologia (CCET). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Alan Costa dos Santos ; Raul Celistrino Teixeira ; Romain Pierre Marcel Bachelard
• Associated research grant: 19/13143-0 - Cold atoms, photons, and quantum correlations, AP.R

Abstract

Some of the most cherished points of interest globally are infused with physics, from the Great Pyramid of Giza (and the story of its remarkable construction) to the Northern Lights (created by charged particles dancing in the Earth's magnetic field). In physics itself there are also points of interest. We may think of a physical theory as providing a kind of "map" of a physical system, showing all the possible types of behaviour which may occur. Certain points on the map are of greater significance than others, because they describe how the system behaves in a useful or interesting way. One example is when pushing a child on a swing: timing your pushes in-sync with the swinging child brings about oscillations of increasingly large amplitude. This is a special point of interest in the map of the child-swing problem: the point of resonance. In modern physics there has been much interest in the creation and manipulation of a certain other points of interest, known as exceptional points. Exceptional points can arise in physical systems which exchange energy with their external environment in a balanced way (so that the gain from and loss into the environment exactly cancels out). However, much less is known about exceptional points in truly quantum systems. The creation of a theory of quantum exceptional points, the main goal of the present proposal, which we envisage to be far richer than their classical counterparts, would allow us to draw the full map of quantum systems, with direct application to the next generation of quantum technology. (AU)