Black Holes, Quantum Entanglement and the No-Go Theorem

 

Graphic from Scientific American.

 

Our team at Los Alamos National Laboratory, along with other collaborators, has focused on studying algorithms for quantum computers and, in particular, machine-learning algorithms—what some like to call artificial intelligence. The research sheds light on what sorts of algorithms will do real work on existing noisy, intermediate-scale quantum computers and on unresolved questions in quantum mechanics at large.

 

In particular, we have been studying the training of variational quantum algorithms. They set up a problem-solving landscape where the peaks represent the high-energy (undesirable) points of the system, or problem, and the valleys are the low-energy (desirable) values. To find the solution, the algorithm works its way through a mathematical landscape, examining its features one at a time. The answer lies in the deepest valley. (Full Story)

 

 

 

‘Two Americas’ may emerge as Delta variant spreads and vaccination rates drop

 

 

An empty COVID-19 vaccination clinic Photo credit: The Guardian.

 

Bette Korber, a computational biologist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, said she expected variant Delta to become the most common variant in the US within weeks. “It’s really moving quickly,” Korber told Buzzfeed. (Full Story)

 

 

 

NASA's IBEX satellite creates first-ever 3D map of the sun's heliosphere 

Graphic from NASA.

 

In a monumental example of NASA's ongoing solar cartography efforts, the boundary of the sun's mysterious heliosphere has finally been mapped in 3D for the first time ever, providing a wealth of new insights as to how solar and interstellar winds intersect and interact.

 

To achieve this task, NASA's Earth-orbiting IBEX satellite detects particles that emerge from the sun's heliosheath, which can then be recorded and labeled. Led by Dr. Dan Reisenfeld of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, this endeavor forced Reisenfeld and his colleagues to dissect IBEX data to chart the edges of this cosmic zone known as the heliopause. (Full Story)

 

 

 

Los Alamos National Lab prepares for fire season

Preperations for fire season.

 

Los Alamos National Laboratory is working to protect the wildlands around its campus from fires. “As time moves on, the vegetation grows. We just got a recent rain here in the last two days, the grass component will come back stronger, two days of drying and we’re back to a dry component,” said LANL Wildland Fire Manager Richard Nieto.

 

The lab’s Wildland Fire Division maintains the roads and evacuation routes through its wilderness areas. They also do regular tours with the Los Alamos Fire Department to come up with response plans.

 

In the last couple of years, LANL has removed 2,500 felled trees and donated the wood to local pueblos. They have also upgraded bridges on lab property to better accommodate fire response. (Full Story)

The Delta variant could create “two Americas” of COVID, experts warn

Graphic from BuzzFeed.

 

The Delta coronavirus variant, which devastated India and forced the UK to delay lifting its remaining coronavirus restrictions, is now on the rise in the US. What that means for you will depend on whether you are fully vaccinated and where you live.

 

It’s unclear whether Delta will dominate as quickly and totally as it did in the UK, where it replaced an outbreak driven almost entirely by the Alpha variant. In the US, a larger number of competing variants are circulating, making it harder to predict what will happen, Bette Korber, a computational biologist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, told BuzzFeed News. But she expects Delta to become the most common variant in the US within weeks. “It’s really moving quickly,” Korber said. (Full Story)

 

Los Alamos lab aids efforts to boost plastic recycling

 

Sorters at the Buckman recycling and transfer center, New Mexican photo.

 

Los Alamos National Laboratory is part of a consortium developing a technology to rapidly break down discarded plastic at the molecular level into components that can be used to create other materials, such as nylon. Early research has led to identifying enzymes that can biodegrade plastic noticeably within several days, versus the several hundred years it normally would take for the material to decompose. 

 

Now the teams want to accelerate the decomposition, because breaking down the plastic in days is not nearly fast enough, lab scientist Taraka Dale said. “So what we’re shooting for is really observable changes and degradation in a matter of, ideally, hours,” said Dale, who leads the lab’s BOTTLE program. “So that you can, in theory, put this in an industrial process eventually.” (Full Story)

 

Los Alamos National Lab studies smoke from western fires

 

Scientists at Los Alamos National Lab studied smoke from Arizona and southwest New Mexico to see how the smoke affects the public and the climate. It's the small particles that cause us some trouble. “Anything below 2.5 microns is actually classified as toxic by the EPA,” said Manvedra Dubey, a Los Alamos scientist. "That is toxic because it gets into your lungs. It can penetrate your nose and get into your lungs."

 

The smoke’s chemical composition affects air quality, human health and regional climate, said James Lee, a Los Alamos Scientist. “It’s white because it's actually scattering light or reflecting light. And that has influence on climate when it's a really large fire, actually reducing the amount of sunlight that is reaching earth's surface," he said. (Full Story)

 

Thin, stretchable biosensors could make surgery safer

 

Biosensor attached to a pig heart obtained commercially. Purdue photo.

 

A research team from Los Alamos National Laboratory and Purdue University have developed bio-inks for biosensors that could help localize critical regions in tissues and organs during surgical operations.

 

"The ink used in the biosensors is biocompatible and provides a user-friendly design with excellent workable time frames of more than one day," said Kwan-Soo Lee, of Los Alamos' Chemical Diagnostics and Engineering group.

 

The new biosensors allow for simultaneous recording and imaging of tissues and organs during surgical procedures. (Full Story)

 

Also from Science Daily this week:

 

Boundary of heliosphere mapped

 

For the first time, the boundary of the heliosphere has been mapped, giving scientists a better understanding of how solar and interstellar winds interact.

 

"Physics models have theorized this boundary for years," said Dan Reisenfeld, a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and lead author on the paper, which was published in the Astrophysical Journal today. "But this is the first time we've actually been able to measure it and make a three-dimensional map of it."

 

The heliosphere is a bubble created by the solar wind, a stream of mostly protons, electrons, and alpha particles that extends from the Sun into interstellar space and protects the Earth from harmful interstellar radiation. (Full Story)

 

Also from New Atlas

What are imaginary numbers?

 

Renaissance mathematicians were first with the idea of imaginary numbers.  From How Stuff Works.

 

Complex numbers with imaginary components also are useful in theoretical physics, explains Rolando Somma, a physicist who works in quantum computing algorithms at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

 

"Due to their relation with trigonometric functions, they are useful for describing, for example, periodic functions," Somma says via email. "These arise as solutions to the wave equations, so we use complex numbers to describe various waves, such an electromagnetic wave. Thus, as in math, complex calculus in physics is an extremely useful tool for simplifying calculations."

 

Complex numbers also have a role in quantum mechanics, a theory that describes the behavior of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. (Full Story)

 

Los Alamos in R&D pact with Quantum Computing Inc. for exascale and petascale simulations

 

“Los Alamos National Laboratory is committed to supporting R&D at the frontier of quantum information sciences to enable responsive solutions for emerging national security needs,” said Irene Qualters, Associate Laboratory Director for Simulation and Computation and leader of Los Alamos’ quantum computing research and development. “There are many interesting problems that require a quantum-classical approach. QCI’s Qatalyst cloud software application provides the classical side to allow us to run larger problems and orchestrate the use of quantum devices in the process, extending the use of quantum computing to solving larger optimization problems.” (Full Story)

 

Also from Homeland Security Today

 

Also from the Reporter this week:

 

New integration of cloud technology leads to more efficient research efforts

 

Through ongoing collaboration between Los Alamos National Laboratory and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), laboratory researchers are now able to use the power of cloud technologies to more efficiently conduct complex scientific research using high-performance computing applications. These technologies allow administrators to perform upgrades and maintenance to computing systems without interfering with critical ongoing work.

 

“By leveraging Linux software containers and container orchestration in both user space and for system management, the Laboratory’s latest Institutional high-performance computing system, named Chicoma, is now providing hundreds of users with greater flexibility than was available on previous generation systems,” said Gary Grider, Los Alamos’ HPC division leader. (Full Story)

 

 

Also from the Los Alamos Daily Post

Driving clean-energy research in the right direction

 

A new collaborative paper out in the journal Joule presents a Los Alamos research team’s assessment of future research targets for advances in fuel cell technology.

 

Fuel cells, part of a promising path toward zero-emission vehicles, are making progress at overcoming some specific challenges on the road to powering heavy-duty vehicles. One near-term need is to ensure the electrochemical and mechanical stability of a key component, the proton exchange membrane at the heart of the fuel cell structure. A new collaborative paper out in the journal Joule presents a research team’s assessment of future research targets. (Full Story)

 

Also from the Daily Post this week:

 

LANL Foundation awards $56,250 in student scholarships

 

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) Foundation, in partnership with the Los Alamos Employees’ Scholarship Fund (LAESF), has announced its 2021 Fall term Career Pathways Scholarship recipients.

 

The Career Pathways Scholarship awards up to $3,000 to qualified applicants pursuing a 2-year degree, trade or certificate. High school seniors and individuals with a high school diploma or GED/High School Equivalency (HSE), or some college experience are encouraged to apply. (Full Story)

 

 

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Messages scrambled by black holes stand their ground against quantum computers

Black holes are nature’s fastest data-scramblers, and new research suggests that secrets thrown into them may be more secure than previously thought. In a paper published in Physical Review Letters, researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in the US show that once a message has been scrambled by a black hole or another system with similar properties, not even a quantum computer can put it back together.

 

The LANL researchers conclude that even if the pieces of a scrambled message are known, putting them back together poses a problem that quantum computers cannot help us solve. “You could perhaps (ambitiously!) try to use the fundamental physics of the black hole to put a message together,” says Zoe Holmes, a postdoctoral scholar at LANL and lead author on the paper, cautioning that no such method is currently known, “but any learning method looks pretty doomed”. Nature, it seems, is a pretty good confidant. (Full Story)

 

The Universe is constantly bathing you in radiation. Incredibly, this could be used for medical diagnosis

 

Mini Muon Tracker at Los Alamos, LANL photo.

 

Now a new study suggests that the Universe’s naturally occurring radiation could be used in medical imaging and could be particularly useful when it comes to COVID-19. The type of radiation in question is cosmic rays. The researchers are from the Los Alamos National Laboratory and used that facility’s Mini Muon Tracker for their study.

 

The term “cosmic rays” is one of science’s historical misnomers. Cosmic rays are not actually rays, but rather high-energy particles, usually protons. They can originate from the Sun, from somewhere else in the Milky Way, or from even further beyond, from some distant location in the Universe. When these high-energy particles reach us, they collide and interact with Earth’s atmosphere, producing muons. A muon is similar to an electron but with a much greater mass. (Full Story)

 

Boundary of heliosphere mapped for the first time

 

Heliosphere diagram, NASA image.

 

For the first time, the boundary of the heliosphere has been mapped, giving scientists a better understanding of how solar and interstellar winds interact. 

 

“Physics models have theorized this boundary for years,” said Dan Reisenfeld, a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and lead author on the paper, which was published in the Astrophysical Journal today. “But this is the first time we’ve actually been able to measure it and make a three-dimensional map of it.” 

 

The heliosphere is a bubble created by the solar wind, a stream of mostly protons, electrons, and alpha particles that extends from the Sun into interstellar space and protects the Earth from harmful interstellar radiation. (Full Story)

 

Also from The Reporter this week:

 

Los Alamos National Lab teams with international group to examine spread of infectious disease by migratory birds

 

Migratory birds along the Mediterranean and Black Sea Flyway, LANL image.

 

A multinational effort is underway to understand and control the spread of disease among migratory birds. Called the Avian Zoonotic Disease Network, it is aimed at detecting dangerous infectious diseases and pathogens of pandemic potential, such as avian influenza. The timing is fortuitous, given that in early June China announced the first known human case of H10N3 bird flu.

 

“Partnering with Michigan State University, CRDF Global, and researchers from Georgia, Jordan and Ukraine, we’ll have a multidisciplinary team working along what’s known as the Mediterranean and Black Sea Flyway (MBSF), the main migration route for birds between Africa and Europe,” said Jeanne Fair, a project partner from Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Biosecurity and Public Health group and an expert in animal disease ecology and epidemiology. (Full Story)

 

It’s topology, naturally

 

Toroidal geometry of a tokamak along with a cross section,  from Phys Rev Letters.

 

Having tested the waters of plasma topology, Penn State researchers along with Joshua Burby at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, considered a more exciting system: the tokamak. In any radial cross-section of this doughnut-shaped geometry, contour lines can be drawn to represent the magnetic shear (where the magnetic field changes direction) in the ions making up the plasma. 

 

In fact, experimental plasma physicists are already aware of such topological waves. They are known as a reversed-shear Alfvén eigenmodes (RSAEs), and are something of a double-edged sword. On one hand, they can resonate with the products of a fusion reaction – alpha particles – causing them and their associated energy to be ejected from the confinement before they can be harnessed for fusion power. (Full Story)

 

Why arctic soil can go slip-sliding away

 

Arctic soil movement, or solifluction, looks like dripping paint or melting cake icing. LANL photo.

 

Slow-moving arctic soils form patterns that, from a distance, resemble those found in common fluids such as drips in paint and birthday cake icing. Los Alamos researchers and their collaborators analyzed existing arctic soil formations and compared them to viscous fluids, determining that there is a physical explanation for this pattern that is common to both Earth and Mars landscapes.

 

"The study of this effect is especially important as we measure landscape response to climate change and aim to understand the storage and release of permafrost carbon in arctic landscapes," said Rachel Glade, first author on a paper in the journal PNAS. "As we see permafrost thaw across the arctic, we will need to be able to predict and mitigate arctic slope instabilities." (Full Story)

 

Exploring the limitations of quantum machine learning

 

Recent research at the Los Alamos National Laboratory showed that Quantum Machine Learning cannot be used to investigate processes like Quantum Chaos and terminalization. This places a big limit on the learning of any new process linked to it through Quantum computing. The study was based on a Hayden-Preskill thought experiment. A fictitious character Alice tosses her book inside the black hole. 

 

The book was pulled out by Bob, who used entanglement to pull it out. Through any computation bringing the book back to its original state is impossible. Though the book was pulled out using quantum computing algorithms, the information was scrambled and no quantum machine learning model could unscramble the book back to its original state. (Full Story)

 

Los Alamos scientists earn DOE early career awards

 

Miles Beaux, left, and Matt Durham, LANL photo.

 

Two Los Alamos scientists, Miles Beaux and Matt Durham, are among 83 scientists who will receive a total of $100 million through the Department of Energy’s Early Career Awards Program, which supports critical research at universities and national laboratories.

 

“This recognition from the Department of Energy reflects Miles’ and Matt’s dedication and commitment to vital scientific questions,” said Laboratory Director Thom Mason. “Los Alamos National Laboratory is proud of their accomplishments and looks forward to seeing what the future brings for them both.” (Full Story)

 

Also from The Reporter this week:

 

UNM and LANL celebrate creation of mechanical engineering program

 

Thom Mason chats with UNM-LA Chancellor Cynthia Rooney, right, and NM Rep. Christine Chandler, UNM photo.

 

UNM School of Engineering, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is celebrating the creation of a program in Mechanical Engineering to meet local workforce needs. UNM-LA hosted an event with a limited number of in-person attendees to recognize the partnership. The collaboration will expand the existing two-year pre-engineering program to a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering (BSME) program on the UNM-LA campus.  

 

“Partnerships like this are essential to providing possibilities for our current workforce and for preparing the workforce of the future,” said LANL Director Thom Mason. “I thank the University of New Mexico and UNM-Los Alamos for recognizing the need to train new mechanical engineers for high-paying jobs that are in demand at the Laboratory and nationwide.” (Full Story)

 

 

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