We hope you’ll join us for a public lecture presented by Nicole Yunger Halpern featuring her recent book Quantum Steampunk, the Physics of Yesterday’s Tomorrow. Nicole completed her PhD in 2018, working with John Preskill and has been an active member of the IQIM community. We’re excited to share her new book with you.
Friday, April 29 beginning at 4:30 pm
105 Annenberg
- Reception and book signing will be held outside, following the talk (about 5:30 pm until 6:30 pm). Vroman’s Bookstore will have copies of the book available for purchase, or please bring your own copy.
- This is an in-person event. All attendees will need to show either a Caltech ID or current proof of vaccination and boosters. All attendees at events on campus must be fully vaccinated and boosted if they are eligible for a booster dose, or more than 30 days from becoming eligible.
- Caltech requires that high-quality masks (surgical, N95s, KN95s, or KF95s) be worn in all indoor locations on campus
Please RSVP by completing this form: https://forms.gle/e1afdhmy4bwWLyov8
Details about parking and a link to an interactive campus map are available at: https://parking.caltech.edu/parking-info/visitor-parking The talk will be in the Walter and Leonore Annenberg Center for Information Science and Technology, Room 105 Building #16. Parking is available in the Holliston Parking Structure and also surface lots entered off Del Mar at Michigan Ave.
If you have questions or need additional information, please contact Marcia Brown (marcia.brown@caltech.edu).
This talk is sponsored by IQIM, the Institute for Quantum Information and Matter at Caltech
The Industrial Revolution meets the quantum-technology revolution! A steampunk adventure guide to how quantum physics is transforming our understanding of information and energy. QUANTUM STEAMPUNK The Physics of Yesterday’s Tomorrow By: Nicole Yunger Halpern Quantum Steampunk | Hopkins Press (jhu.edu)
Victorian era steam engines and particle physics may seem worlds (as well as centuries) apart, yet a new branch of science, quantum thermodynamics, re-envisions the scientific underpinnings of the Industrial Revolution through the lens of today’s roaring quantum information revolution. Classical thermodynamics, understood as the study of engines, energy, and efficiency, needs reimagining to take advantage of quantum mechanics, the basic framework that explores the nature of reality by peering at minute matters, down to the momentum of a single particle. In her exciting new book, intrepid Caltech and Harvard-trained physicist Nicole Yunger Halpern introduces these concepts to the uninitiated with what she calls “quantum steampunk,” after the fantastical genre that pairs futuristic technologies with Victorian sensibilities. While readers follow the adventures of a rag-tag steampunk crew on trains, dirigibles, and automobiles, they explore questions such as, “Can quantum physics revolutionize engines/” and “What deeper secrets can quantum information reveal about the trajectory of time?”
Yunger Halpern also describes her own adventures in the quantum universe and provides an insider’s look at the work of the scientists obsessed with its technological promise. Moving from fundamental physics to cutting-edge experimental applications, Quantum Steampunk explores the field’s aesthetic, shares its whimsy, and gazes into the potential of a quantum future. The result is a blast for fans of science, science fiction, and fantasy.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Nicole Yunger Halpern (CAMBRIDGE, MA) is a theoretical physicist at the Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science at the University of Maryland. She earned her PhD at Caltech, winning the international Ilya Prigogine Prize for a thermodynamic thesis. She won the International Quantum Technology Emerging Researcher Award from the British Institute of Physics as an ITAMP Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University.
Reviews:
Like any good quantum system, this book is complex, entangled, and unpredictable. Yunger Halpern provides an expert tour of the bustling new research frontier at the intersection of physics, information, and technology, complete with goggles and brass fittings.
— Sean M. Carroll, New York Times bestselling author of Something Deeply Hidden: Quantum Worlds and the Emergence of Spacetime
With the heart of both an artist and a scientist, Yunger Halpern explores two of the hottest fields in modern physics: quantum thermodynamics and quantum information. This wild and entertaining work will take you on an enchanting ride, illuminating the deeper meaning of knowledge, time, and even reality itself.
— Leonard Mlodinow, author of Stephen Hawking: A Memoir of Friendship and Physics
