VIII. Earth Earns: An Open CoCreative Earthropocene to Astropocene PediaVerse

1. Mind Over Matter and Energy: Quantum, Atomic, Chemical, Astronomic Realms

Das, Anirban, et al. Dark Matter Induced Power in Quantum Devices. arXiv:2210.09313. We cite this paper by SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory physicists, among much similar work each day to once record the apparent limitless abilities of our Earthuman ecosmic descriptive project. At what point might we peoples ask whatever is our participant role and purpose of this micro-ecosmic sdescriptive self quantification.

We present single quasiparticle devices as new dark matter (DM) detectors. The threshold of these devices is set by the cooper pair binding energy, which is so low that they can detect DM as light as about an MeV incoming from the Galactic halo.. Using power measurements with these devices, we set new constraints on the DM scattering cross section for DM masses from about 1 MeV to 10 GeV. We note future directions to improve halo DM and a thermalized DM population in the Earth using power deposition in quantum devices. (Excerpt)

De Pablo, Juan, et al. New Frontiers for the Materials Genome Initiative. Npj Computational Materials. 5/41, 2019. In this new Nature journal, in partnership with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, twenty five researchers from universities and institutes across the USA preview of this worldwide endeavor which augurs to begin a new atomic and bio-chemical creation. A synthesis of deep neural net learning, algorithmic computations, and the latest stereochemical imaging has led to a steady flow of beneficial nanomaterials. But of most interest for a natural genesis is its metaphoric citation as an essential genetic project. Might coinage like atomics, atom-informatics, matteromics and more be rightly availed? See also Genetic Algorithms for Computational Materials Discovery Accelerated by Machine Learning by Paul Jennings, et al in this same issue (5/46), Materials Informatics by Krishna Rajan (a coauthor) in Annual Review of Materials Research (45/153, 2015), and Machine Learning in Materials Informatics by Rampi Ramprasad, et al in this journal (2017).

The Materials Genome Initiative (www.mgi.gov) advanced a new paradigm for accelerated materials discovery, design and development, by way of complementary efforts in theory, computation, and experiment. In May 2017, the National Science Foundation sponsored the workshop “Advancing and Accelerating Materials Innovation Through the Synergistic Interaction among Computation, Experiment, and Theory: Opening New Frontiers” to review accomplishments that emerged from investments in science and infrastructure. We cite key findings from the workshop and novel perspectives to guide future materials research and its translation into societal advantage. (Abstract)

De S. Cameron, Nigel and M. Ellen Mitchell, eds. Nanoscale: Issues and Perspectives for the Nano Century. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2007. Another volume to try to make sense of the sudden advent of God-like capabilities to remake natural creation and our own bodies, brains, selves, and progeny. Somewhat formal and governmental, it struggles with a contrary culture that remains immersed in an unrepealed, fallen realm of flawed penitents. Futurist James Hughes’ article Beyond Human Nature wonders, in a different vein from Ted Peters (op. cit. in Allhoff, et al this section), why we are able to reinvent ourselves.

Deane-Drummond, Celia, et al, eds. Technofutures, Nature and the Sacred. Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2015. There are several collections in this site section that seek to explore and consider a respectful way forward as auspicious potentials present themselves for collaborative human beings to intentionally imagine and remake every creature and cosmos anew. But the effort is tacitly confounded by ancient beliefs of a fallen world and flawed persons who ought not, without an admission of a self-existing, purposeful genesis universe to provide any intrinsic guidance and rationale. The chapter The Technologisation of Life: Theology and the Trans-Human and Trans-Animal Narratives of the Post-Animal by University of Notre Dame theologian Deane-Drummond might be the best entry.

The capacity of human beings to invent, construct and use technical artifacts is a hugely consequential factor in the evolution of society, and in the entangled relations between humans, other creatures and their natural environments. Moving from a critical consideration of theories, to narratives about technology, and then to particular and specific practices, Technofutures, Nature and the Sacred seeks to arrive at a genuinely transdisciplinary perspective focusing attention on the intersection between technology, religion and society and using insights from the environmental humanities. It works from both theoretical and practical contexts by using newly emerging case studies, including geo-engineering and soil carbon technologies, and breaks open new ground by engaging theological, scientific, philosophical and cultural aspects of the technology/religion/nature nexus. Encouraging us to reflect on the significance and place of religious beliefs in dealing with new technologies, and engaging critical theory common in sociological, political and literary discourses, the authors explore the implicit religious claims embedded in technology.

Diamanti, Eleni. Quantum Signals Could Soon Span the Globe. Nature. 549/41, 2017. A commentary by a Pierre and Marie Curie University theorist on two papers in this issue, Satellite-to-Ground Quantum Key Distribution by Sheng-Kai Liao, et al, and Ground to Satellite Quantum Teleportation by Ji-Gang Ren, et al, which describe breakthrough beginnings of a worldwide quantum Internet with vast novel capacities. Both articles have over thirty, mostly the same, authors from institutions such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Center for Excellence and Synergetic Innovation Center in Quantum Information and Quantum Physics, Key Laboratory of Space Active Opto-Electronic Technology, Shanghai Institute of Technical Physics and so on. (A concurrent NY Times op-ed piece notes that while the USA and UK are lately defunding scientific research, China is forging 21st century advances such as this, along with all manner of renewable energies.)

The laws of quantum physics give rise to protocols for ultra-secure cryptography and quantum communications. However, to be useful in a global network, these protocols will have to function with satellites. Extending existing protocols to such long distances poses a tremendous experimental challenge. Researchers led by Jian-Wei Pan present a pair of papers in this issue that take steps toward a global quantum network, using the low-Earth-orbit satellite Micius. They demonstrate satellite-to-ground quantum key distribution, an integral part of quantum cryptosystems, at kilohertz rates over 1,200 kilometres, and report quantum teleportation of a single-photon qubit over 1,400 kilometres. Quantum teleportation is the transfer of the exact state of a quantum object from one place to another, without physical travelling of the object itself, and is a central process in many quantum communication protocols. These two experiments suggest that Micius could become the first component in a global quantum internet. (Editor’s summary)

Dong, Xiao, et al. A Stable Compound of Helium and Sodium at High Pressure. Nature Chemistry. 9/5, 2017. A 17 member team based in China, Russia, the USA, Spain, and Germany achieve the first ever combined form of the most noble gas with another element. See also a commentary by Maosheng Miao in the same issue. We note in Mind over Matter as a premier example whence phenomenal human beings can advance nature’s materiality in ways that the old cosmos itself cannot.

Helium is generally understood to be chemically inert and this is due to its extremely stable closed-shell electronic configuration, zero electron affinity and an unsurpassed ionization potential. It is not known to form thermodynamically stable compounds, except a few inclusion compounds. Here, using the ab initio evolutionary algorithm USPEX and subsequent high-pressure synthesis in a diamond anvil cell, we report the discovery of a thermodynamically stable compound of helium and sodium, Na2He, which has a fluorite-type structure and is stable at pressures >113 GPa. We show that the presence of He atoms causes strong electron localization and makes this material insulating. (Abstract)

Faber, Felix, et al. Alchemical and Structural Distribution Based Representation for Universal Quantum Machine Learning. Journal of Chemical Physics. 148/241717, 2019. University of Basel chemists describe ways that cerebral and computational methods used to make atomic and biocompound formulations can gain rootings in an ab initio quantum realm. Allusions to a 21st century alchemy are prompted as collective human intelligence and ingenuity, drawing upon newly active natural phenomena, can begin to convert and create a novel materiality. See also Physical Machine Learning Outperforms “Human Learning” in Quantum Chemistry at arXiv:1908.00971, Recent Advances and Applications of Machine Learning in Solid-state Materials Science by Jonathan Schmidt, et al in npj Computational Materials (5/83, 2019), and The Alchemical Energy Landscape for a Pentameric Cluster in Journal of Chemical Physics (152/014106, 2019).

We introduce a representation of any atom in any chemical environment for the automatized generation of universal kernel ridge regression-based quantum machine learning (QML) models of electronic properties. The representation is based on Gaussian distribution functions, scaled by power laws and accounting for structural as well as elemental degrees of freedom. The elemental components help us to lower the QML model’s learning curve, and, through interpolation across the periodic table, even enable “alchemical extrapolation” to covalent bonding between elements not part of training. This point is demonstrated for the prediction of covalent binding in single, double, and triple bonds among main-group elements as well as for atomization energies in organic molecules. (Abstract excerpt)

Fagerberg, Jan, et al, eds. Innovations Studies: Evolution and Future Challenges. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. A Norwegian, Danish and British team edits conference proceedings about how to reorient education, companies, institutions, societies and states, to be more innovative, as broadly conceived, to achieve a much better world. And while perusing, one wonders if here is another role for the human phenomenon so as to begin a new intentional creation.

Gaining such knowledge is the aim of the field of innovation studies, which is now at least half a century old. Hence, it is an opportune time to ask what has been achieved and what we still need to know more about. This is what this book sets out to explore. Written by a number of central contributors to the field, it critically examines the current state of the art and identifies issues that merit greater attention. The focus is mainly on how society can derive the greatest benefit from innovation and what needs to done to achieve this. However, to learn more about how society can benefit more from innovation, one also needs to understand innovation processes in firms and how these interact with broader social, institutional and political factors.

Fleming, Graham and Mark Ratner. Grand Challenges in Basic Energy Sciences. Physics Today. July, 2008. A summary of the task work and publications of the Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee of the Department of Energy, chaired by the authors, which can be accessed here: http://www.sc.doe.gov/bes/reports/abstracts.html#GC. To its credit, the effort delves deeper than a litany of alternatives sources to evoke a new creation by way of mind over matter at the scale of the electron. By this vista, to reflect, informed sentience appears in a cosmic genesis via planetary cerebration to begin a second singularity and phase of intentional redesign, control, and optimization for the material sustenance of life and persons.

Floreano, Dario and Claudio Mattiussi. Bio-Inspired Artificial Intelligence. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2008. Swiss Federal Institute of Technology computer scientists sketch a ‘new AI’ beyond machine-cybernetic efforts so as to model natural viabilities that exhibit “behavioral autonomy, self-healing, social interaction, evolution and learning.” Chapters variously survey Evolutionary, Cellular, Neural, Developmental, Immune, Behavioral, and Collective Systems that reproduce and express “the same processes that operate in nature” such as self-organization and dynamic network geometries. By this approach, it ought to be noted, as these creative attributes may now pass to intentional human furtherance.

Forbes, Nancy. Imitation of Life: How Biology is Inspiring Computing. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2004. A survey of artificial neural networks, DNA computation, nanoscale self-assembly, amorphous computing, cellular automata, genetic algorithmns, and artificial life on the way to a biologically-based digital future.

Frei, Regina and Giovanna Di Marzo Serugendo. The Future of Complexity Engineering. Central European Journal of Engineering. 2/2, 2012. In this new Springer journal, Cranfield University and University of Geneva applied scientists offer another take on how might creative natural principles of organic evolution might be defined and carried ahead so as to reinhabit a better local and global, sustainable world.

Complexity Engineering encompasses a set of approaches to engineering systems which are typically composed of various interacting entities often exhibiting self-* behaviours and emergence. The engineer or designer uses methods that benefit from the findings of complexity science and often considerably differ from the classical engineering approach of “divide and conquer”. This article provides an overview on some very interdisciplinary and innovative research areas and projects in the field of Complexity Engineering, including synthetic biology, chemistry, artificial life, self-healing materials and others. It then classifies the presented work according to five types of nature-inspired technology, namely: (1) using technology to understand nature, (2) nature-inspiration for technology, (3) using technology on natural systems, (4) using biotechnology methods in software engineering, and (5) using technology to model nature. Finally, future trends in Complexity Engineering are indicated and related risks are discussed.

Previous   1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10  Next  [More Pages]