VIII. Earth Earns: An Open Participatory Earthropocene to Astropocene CoCreative Future

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

Kaku, Michio. Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2023. In his latest contribution (search) the physicist science explainer once again illumes this positive frontier which through humankind's imagination and cooperative endeavor has a grand opportunity to achieve a much better, sustained future. I will review much more in the days ahead.

An exhilarating tour of humanity's next great technological achievement—quantum computing—which may eventually illuminate the deepest mysteries of science, supercharge artificial intelligence, and solve some of humanity's biggest problems, like global warming, world hunger, and incurable disease,

The runaway success of the microchip processor may be reaching its end. Running up against the physical constraints of smaller and smaller sizes, traditional silicon chips are not likely to prove useful in solving humanity’s greatest challenges, from climate change, to global starvation, to incurable diseases. But the quantum computer, which harnesses the power and complexity of the atomic realm, already promises to be every bit as revolutionary as the transistor and microchip once were. Its unprecedented gains in computing power herald advancements that could change every aspect of our daily lives.

Told with Kaku’s signature clarity and enthusiasm, Quantum Supremacy is the story of this exciting frontier and the race to claim humanity’s future.

Kalinin, Sergei, et al. Fire Up the Atom Forge. Nature. 539/485, 2016. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Institute for Functional Imaging, Center for Nanophase Materials researchers describe novel abilities to manipulate individual atoms. As if “quantum Legos,” by reaching this datum an intentional phase of a new atomic and chemical nature may commence. See also a cited reference Dynamic Scan Control in STEM (Scanning transmission electron microscopy) in Advanced Structural and Chemical Imaging by Xiahan Sang, et al (Vol. 2/Art. 6, 2016), a new Springer journal. For another view see Atom-by-Atom Assembly by Manuel Endres, et al in Science (354/1024, 2016).

Materials could be made from scratch by enhancing a microscope that uses an electron beam to image the structure of crystals. Making the electron beam programmable — to vary how many electrons are fired, to where and for how long — would allow atoms to be moved, added or knocked out. The structure of the material needs to be monitored in real time so that progress can be followed and mistakes corrected. (Summary 487) Let us make a start: the ability to build new forms of matter from the atom up will mark a new chapter of nanoscience. (487)

Keane, Christopher. Chaos in Collective Health: Fractal Dynamics of Social Learning. Journal of Theoretical Biology. Online August, 2016. As the Abstract explains, a University of Pittsburgh professor of behavioral and community health sciences demonstrates how even such intense human activity can be modeled by common mathematical complexities which exhibit a reliable invariance across scales and situations. Again upon reflection, our collective cognizance can avail these independent forms and dynamics so as to achieve a palliative surcease of the human condition.

Physiology often exhibits non-linear, fractal patterns of adaptation. I show that such patterns of adaptation also characterize collective health behavior in a model of collective health. Protection in which individuals use highest payoff biased social learning to decide whether or not to protect against a spreading disease, but benefits of health are shared locally. This model results in collectives of protectors with an exponential distribution of sizes, smaller ones being much more likely. This distribution of protecting collectives, in turn, results in incidence patterns often seen in infectious disease which, although they seem to fluctuate randomly, actually have an underlying order, a fractal time trend pattern. The time trace of infection incidence shows a self-similarity coefficient consistent with a fractal distribution and anti-persistence, reflecting the negative feedback created by health protective behavior responding to disease, when the benefit of health is high enough to stimulate health protection.

When the benefit of health is too low to support any health protection, the self-similarity coefficient shows high persistence, reflecting positive feedback resulting the unmitigated spread of disease. Thus the self-similarity coefficient closely corresponds to the level of protection, demonstrating that what might otherwise be regarded as “noise” in incidence actually reflects the fact that protecting collectives form when the spreading disease is present locally but drop protection when disease subsides locally, mitigating disease intermittently. These results hold not only in a deterministic version of the model in a regular lattice network, but also in small-world networks with stochasticity in infection and efficacy of protection. The resulting non-linear and chaotic patterns of behavior and disease cannot be explained by traditional epidemiological methods but a simple agent-based model is sufficient to produce these results. (Abstract)

Keimer, Bernard and Joel Moore. The Physics of Quantum Materials. Nature Physics. 13/11, 2017. We cite this late 2017s entry by MPI Solid State Research and UC Berkeley physicists, among an increasing number, to report how novel abilities to engage this off-putting, arcane realm have now become amenable and commonplace. A “quantum collective phenomena” is found, along with other features more classical in kind, as human inquiry and innovation seems poised to take over material creation going forward.

The physical description of all materials is rooted in quantum mechanics, which describes how atoms bond and electrons interact at a fundamental level. In recent years there has been growing interest in material systems where quantum effects remain manifest over a wider range of energy and length scales such as superconductors, graphene, topological insulators, Weyl semimetals, quantum spin liquids, and spin ices. Many derive their properties from reduced dimensionality, in particular from confinement of electrons to two-dimensional sheets. Moreover, they tend to be materials in which electrons cannot be considered as independent particles but interact strongly and give rise to collective excitations known as quasiparticles. In all cases, however, quantum-mechanical effects fundamentally alter properties of the material. (Abstract excerpts)

Keinan, E. and I. Schechter, eds. Chemistry for the 21st Century. Weinheim, GDR: Wiley-VCH, 2001. A survey of the dawning ability to recreate material nature through computational studies and discrete atomic interactions. A typical article is “Quantum Alchemy.” In an introduction Jean Marie Lehn views this supramolecular phase as a “...general science of informed matter. The essence of chemistry is not only to discover but to invent, and above all, to create. The book of chemistry is not only to be read but to be written!”

Khajetoorians, Alexander, et al. Designer Quantum States of Matter Created Atom-by-Atom. arXiv:1904.11680. In an article to appear in Nature Reviews Physics, Radboud University, Delft University of Technology and Utrecht University scientists including Ingmar Swart review this future frontier as our globally collaborative human agency begins a second, intentional material creation. An Integrated Nanolab will then avail tunneling, spin lattices, topography, atomic resolution, quasiparticles, magnetism, spectroscopy qualities and much more.

With the advances in high resolution scanning tunneling microscopy as well as atomic-scale manipulation, it has become possible to create and characterize quantum states of matter bottom-up, atom-by-atom. We review recent advances in creating artificial electronic and spin lattices that lead to exotic quantum phases of matter from topological Dirac dispersion to complex magnetic order. We also project future perspectives in non-equilibrium dynamics, prototype technologies, engineered quantum phase transitions and topology, as well as the evolution of complexity from simplicity in this newly developing field. (Abstract)

Klishin, Andrei, et al. Statistical Physics of Design. New Journal of Physics. 20/103038, 2018. University of Michigan researchers including Greg van Anders post a novel entry which draws on basic nonequilibrium condensed matter principles with the aim to intentionally create novel, materials and structures. An update paper by this group is Robust Design in Systems Physics at arXiv:1805.02691 (second quote).

A key challenge in complex design problems that permeate science and engineering is the need to balance design objectives for specific design elements or subsystems with global system objectives. Here, using examples from arrangement problems, we show that the systems-level application of statistical physics principles, which we term "systems physics", provides a detailed characterization of subsystem design in terms of the concepts of stress and strain. Our approach generalizes straightforwardly to design problems in a wide range of other disciplines that require concrete understanding of how the pressure to meet overall design objectives drives the outcomes for component subsystems. (Abstract)

Ensuring robust outcomes and designs is a crucial challenge in the engineering of modern integrated systems that are comprised of many heterogeneous subsystems. Here, we show that the response of design elements to whole-system specification changes can be characterized, as materials are, using strong/weak and brittle/ductile dichotomies. We find these dichotomies emerge from a mesoscale treatment of early stage design problems that we cast in terms of stress--strain relationships. (1805.02691)

Koonin, Eugene and Michael Halperin. Sequence-Evolution-Function: Computational Approaches in Comparative Genomics. Norwell, MA: Kluwer Academic, 2003. A technical source. Chapter 8 is “Genomes and the Protein Universe.”

Kozinsky, Boris and David Singh. Thermoelectrics by Computational Design. Annual Review of Materials Research. 51/565, 2020. We cite this entry by Harvard University and University of Missouri engineers as an example of how Earthuman technical creativities are now passing to this collective stage, and how this new method could to initiate a novel, second phase of ecosmic energetic vitality. The field is also familiar to me as I was involved in its early 1960s phase by way of Seebeck and Peliter effects with lead telluride alloys.

The performance of thermoelectric materials is determined by their electrical and thermal transport properties that are very sensitive to small modifications of composition and microstructure. Discovery and design of next-generation materials are starting to be accelerated by computational guidance. We highlight the first successful examples of computation-driven discoveries of high-performance materials and discuss avenues for tightening the interaction between theoretical and experimental materials discovery and optimization.

Krylov, Anna, et al. Perspective Computational Chemistry Software and its Advancement as Illustrated through Three Grand Challenge Cases for Molecular Science. Journal of Chemical Physics. 149/18, 2018. 15 scientists from California, Iowa, Texas, Virginia, New York, New Jersey, and Germany post another example of how our human co-creation of novel materials is taking on an organic form by way of an informative program at work. I was variously engaged in this field since the 1960s, so can appreciate how revolutionary this added “genotype” dimension is, which we are just beginning to appreciate. See also ElemNet: Deep Learning the Chemistry of Materials from only Elemental Composition by Dipendra Jha, et al herein for a similar entry.

15 scientists from California, Iowa, Texas, Virginia, New York, New Jersey, and Germany post another example of how our human co-creation of novel materials is taking on an organic form by way of an informative program at work. I was variously engaged in this field since the 1960s, so can appreciate how revolutionary this added “genotype” dimension is, which we are just beginning to appreciate. See also ElemNet: Deep Learning the Chemistry of Materials from only Elemental Composition by Dipendra Jha, et al herein for a similar entry.

Kumar, Nitsch, et al. Topological Quantum Materials from the Viewpoint of Chemistry. Chemical Reviews. 121/5, 2021. We cite this paper in a special Quantum Materials issue by MPI Chemical Physics of Solids researchers as an example of 2021 frontiers as a phenomenal Earthuman sapience appears to learn all about and take over substantial creation going forward. A summary graphic includes quantum transport, thermoelectric, hydrodynamics, catalysis, photoelectrics, data storage and chiral crystals. See also Quantum Information and Algorithms for Correlated Quantum Matter by Kade Head-Marsden, et al in this issue. Yet in a July of record rains and floods, however can we peoples realize our true ecosmic cocreativity in time so as to unite and save this imperiled bioworld?

Topology as a mathematical concept has become a transdisciplinary approach across matter physics, solid state chemistry, and materials science. This review presents the topological concepts from the viewpoint of a solid-state chemist, summarizes techniques for growing single crystals, and describes basic physical property measurement techniques to characterize topological materials beyond their structure and provide examples of such materials. Finally, a brief outlook on the impact of topology in other areas of chemistry is provided at the end of the article.

Kurizki, Gershon, et al. Quantum Technologies with Hybrid Systems. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 112/3866, 2015. As the Abstract notes, a team of Israeli, French, Danish, Greek, and Austrian researchers seek to initiate a new phase of the human intentional continuance and future manifestation of a natural genesis universe. For another instance, see A Universal Quantum Information Processor by Xihua Yang, et al in Nature Scientific Reports (4/6629, 2014).

An extensively pursued current direction of research in physics aims at the development of practical technologies that exploit the effects of quantum mechanics. As part of this ongoing effort, devices for quantum information processing, secure communication, and high-precision sensing are being implemented with diverse systems, ranging from photons, atoms, and spins to mesoscopic superconducting and nanomechanical structures. Their physical properties make some of these systems better suited than others for specific tasks; thus, photons are well suited for transmitting quantum information, weakly interacting spins can serve as long-lived quantum memories, and superconducting elements can rapidly process information encoded in their quantum states. A central goal of the envisaged quantum technologies is to develop devices that can simultaneously perform several of these tasks, namely, reliably store, process, and transmit quantum information. Hybrid quantum systems composed of different physical components with complementary functionalities may provide precisely such multitasking capabilities. This article reviews some of the driving theoretical ideas and first experimental realizations of hybrid quantum systems and the opportunities and challenges they present and offers a glance at the near- and long-term perspectives of this fascinating and rapidly expanding field. (Abstract)

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