Quantum mechanics is the study of the behavior of energy and matter at the atomic, molecular and nuclear levels and sometimes even microscopic levels. The first initial information on quantum mechanics was first discovered in the early 20th century by a pioneering scientist Max Planck, because of this early knowledge of quantum energy it led to the first invention of the transistor. Scientist Max Planck discovered an equation that explained the results of these tests. The equation is as follows, E=Nhf, with E=energy, N=integer, h=constant, f=frequency. In determining this equation, Planck came up with the constant (h), which is now known as "Planck's constant." The word “Quantum” comes from the Latin meaning “how much”, which refers to the units of matter and energy predicted and observed in quantum physics. In day to day life it is understood how the world generally works and how the basic laws of physics come to play. Some examples of this are the following, drop a vase and it will break on the floor due to gravity, push a toy car and it will ride along because pushing something makes it move. Since the turn of the century scientists assumed that all the basic rules of physics applied to everything in nature as well but they did not. Quantum mechanics has also played an important role in technological advances that make modern life possible. Without it the first transistor would not have been invented or the personal computer or laser, and hence no Blu-ray players. Author James Kakalios mentioned in an interview regarding his book titled The Amazing Story of Quantum Mechanics that if you understand and accept the following three ideas, a light is a photon, matter has a wavelength nature associated with its motion and tha...
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...Quantum physics may be able to help doctors locate cancer cells in the body to pinpoint where the cancer cells have spread. These quantum dots glow when they are exposed to ultraviolet radiation and what scientists will be able to do is coat the dots with a material that is attractive to cancel cells. When these quantum dots are injected into the body they will latch on to the cancel cells and will be able to show doctors where to look for the cancer cells.
Works Cited
http://physics.about.com/od/quantumphysics/p/quantumphysics.htm
http://www.pbs.org/transistor/science/info/quantum.html
http://www.quantumintro.com
http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/science-questions/quantum
http://www.discovery.com/tv-shows/curiosity/topics/10-ways-quantum-physics-will-change-world.htm
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/everyday-quantum-physics/
Over the years, surgery has made tremendous progress while changing human perspective; viewed as “no more science than butchery” a couple of centuries ago to now considered to be a solution for many health care problems threatening humans, like cancer, heart disease and kidney failure. Nevertheless, surgery has not been perfected to a level that provides successful results every time it is performed on patients. For example, surgery done to remove tumors in cancer patients result in only 45% of individuals to be cured. However, in order to be successful, the surgical procedure has to be carried out incredibly precisely and incomplete removal of tumors can decrease survival rate. Therefore, surgeons have to be able to recognize diseased tissue and distinguish it between healthy tissues. But even with the use of radioactive tracers and visuals, surgeons are not able to identify the exact site of the unhealthy tissue and its boundaries. Thus, almost 40% of the time cancerous cells are left behind because even the best qualified surgeons are not successful at the nanotechnological scale of tissue.
The novel, Alice and Quantum Land, by Robert Gilmore is an adventure in the Quantum universe. Alice, a normal teenage girl, goes through quantum land and understands what quantum is and how it works. The quantum world is a difficult one to understand, as its nature is one of complex states of being, natures, principles, notions, and the like. When these principles or concepts are compared with the macro world, one can find great similarities and even greater dissimilarities between the world wherein electrons rule, and the world wherein human beings live. In Alice in Quantumland, author Robert Gilmore converts the original tale of Alice in Wonderland from a world of anthropomorphic creatures into the minute world of quantum mechanics, and attempts to ease the reader into this confusing world through a series of analogies (which comprise an allegory) about the principles of quantum mechanics. Through Alice’s adventure she comes across some ideas or features that contradict real world ideas. These ideas are the following: Electrons have no distinguishing spin, the Pauli Exclusion Principle, Superposition, Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and Interference and Wave Particle Duality.
The idea of parallel realities has existed within the literary circle of science fiction for many years. One of the key concepts behind alternate dimensions is that with every action and decision - whether it is consciously made or not - another alternate dimension has the opposite action or decision made, and that there are subsequent realities created in which every other option exists uniquely. Ursula LeGuin's short story "Schrödinger's Cat" is a direct manifestation of the idea of paralleled realities in that the story deals with an experiment that spawns countless paralleled realities. Merely one of the skewed realities is overseen during the course of the narration. The Schrödinger "Gedankenexperiment" ("thinking experiment" in German) is a hypothetical situation in which a cat is placed in a sealed box with a gun and a photon emitter that has a fifty percent chance of firing the gun and killing the cat, and a fifty percent chance of not firing the gun and not killing the cat(2230). The possibility for other outcomes remains ever present, although infinitesimally slim with the percentage of anything else occurring. "We cannot predict the behavior of the photon, and thus, once it has behaved, we cannot predict the state of the system it has determined. We cannot predict it! God plays dice with the world!" (2230) The three characters who appear within "Schrödinger's Cat" act as the different variables within an experiment: the control; the dependent variable; and the independent variable. Each of these characters exists and does not exist within any reality and their existence (or lack of) is dependent upon time and which timeline they are involved i...
The author tells of how waves are effected by quantum mechanic. He also discusses the fact that electromagnetic radiation, or photons, are actually particles and waves. He continues to discuss how matter particles are also matter, but because of their h bar, is so small, the effects are not seen. Green concludes the quantum mechanics discussion by talking about the uncertainty principle.Chapter 5: The need for a New Theory: General Relativity vs.
Over a 1950 summer lunch at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the great physicist Enrico Fermi asked his colleagues an unexpected question – “Don’t you ever wonder where everybody is?” Laughter went around the table as everyone immediately knew that he was talking about extraterrestrial intelligence [1]. If life arises fairly commonly, as Fermi believed, it follows that there should be advanced civilizations with the desire to visit and colonize Earth close enough to do so. However, there is no incontrovertible evidence of aliens on Earth, either now or in the past. This is called the Fermi Paradox. The lack of observational evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence is known as the ‘Great Silence.’[13]
Schrodingers equation is always used for the use of physics and chemistry still to this day. His equation is usually used to find the wave functions to atomic use and electrons and atoms. It also helps explain the Many worlds theory which is used for other experiments as well. The equation uses acceleration, force, and mass. However that is just the simple F=ma. That equation is only used to find what kind of force you need to use, or how much force. The equation can go really deep and long, depending what kind of equation you are trying to use and find. When trying to find Waves and particles you have to find the Mass, Time, speed, etc. Schrodingers equation was slightly more difficult where how do you find a particle, and how do you get
Physics can be found in all aspects of our lives and the world around us including the activities in which we find the most enjoyment. They may not be noticeable to the naked eye or even to our senses but they are there and when we become familiar with the concepts of physics then we began to ‘see’ physics everywhere.
Loss can leave us with the feeling that we are no longer in control of our lives, a strong feeling of instability. We must understand our loss to cope and deal with what has happened. Jo Ann Beard the narrator and author of “The Fourth State of Matter” struggles with several losses throughout the text. She appears to deal with her instability by caring for her aged dog as if she was a sick child, when in reality Beard just wants her problems to disappear. When faced with a complication a difficult choice must be made, to do nothing in hopes the problem will resolve itself or face it head-on. When pretending the problem doesn't exist or similarly telling yourself it will go back to how it was, simply allows
The Ultimate Nature of Matter. The theory of quantum mechanics has divided the atom into a number of fundamental sub-atomic particles. Although the physicist has shown that the atom is not a solid indivisible object, he has not been able to find a particle which does possess those qualities. Talk of particles, though, is misleading because the word suggests a material object.
Metaphysics can be defined as an attempt to comprehend the basic characteristics of reality. It is in fact so basic that it is all inclusive, whether something is observable or not. It answers questions of what things must be like in order to exist and how to differentiate from things that seem real but are not. A common thought is that reality is defined as what we can detect from our five senses. This type of philosophy is called empiricism, which is the idea that all knowledge comes from our senses. An empiricist must therefore believe that what we can see, touch, taste, smell, and hear must be real and that if we can not in fact see, touch, taste, smell, or hear something, it is definitely not real. However, this is a problem because there are things that are real that cannot be detected by our senses. Feelings and thoughts can not be detected, so according to a true empiricist, they must not be real. Another example that is listed in the textbook is the laws of gravity (Stewart 84). This is something that is in fact proven and we can see the effects of it, but we can not see gravity itself. Once again, this would not be considered to be “real.” However, there are certain things that some people consider to be real, and others consider them not to be. This typically comes into play when discussing religion. Some people consider God to be real although they can not “sense” Him and others say that He is not real, possibly because of the fact that they can no...
Quantum mechanics was pioneered by Max Planck, who developed the formula E = hv—which is the base for much of the quantum mechanical field. Quantum theory (the origin of quantum mechanics), as described in Talking Tech, was, at its early core, a handful of theories and hypotheses regarding energy quantization and wave-particle duality (Rheingold and Levine). The book goes on to explain how this realm of science is basically an extension of physics attempting to derive a mathematical specification of how the entirety of the universe operates and behaves at the subatomic level. Conversely, it also describes how quantum theory also diverges from classical physics in that it stipulates that the only...
Werner Heisenberg was the first to realize that certain pairs of measurements have an intrinsic uncertainty associated with them. For instance, if you have a very good idea of where something is located, then, to a certain degree, you must have a poor idea of how fast it is moving or in what direction. We don't notice this in everyday life because any inherent uncertainty from Heisenberg's principle is well within the acceptable accuracy we desire. For example, you may see a parked car and think you know exactly where it is and exactly how fast it is moving. But would you really know those things exactly? If you were to measure the position of the car to an accuracy of a billionth of a billionth of a centimeter, you would be trying to measure the positions of the individual atoms which make up the car, and those atoms would be jiggling around just because the temperature of the car was above absolute zero!
Energy is an odd concept, it is something that is neither here nor there yet has a profound impact on everything, both organic and inorganic. However, energy surrounds us in more ways than is commonly believed; it is possible that matter is only a form of energy. In fact, according to Albert Einstein, matter and energy are different forms of the same thing (“Do Antimatter and Matter Destroy Each Other?”). Through analyzing the superposition of bosons (particles without mass) and fermions (particles with mass), transformations between energy and matter, the creation of mass, and the mass of energy, the existence of what humans consider to be matter will be questioned.
New inventions are created daily; however, it is those that truly change the world that are remembered. The use and discovery of atomic energy negatively impacts the world because of the danger it entails. Many people across the world believe that the use of atomic energy is a mistake based off of past events that have occurred such as the bombings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The abuse of atomic energy has been proven to damage society’s morale, population and could potentially destroy entire populations.
During the seventeenth century, the modern science of physics started to emerge and become a widespread tool used around the world. Many prominent people contributed to the build up of this fascinating field and managed to generally define it as the science of matter and energy and their interactions. However, as we know, physics is much more than that. It explains the world around us in every form imaginable. The study of physics is a fundamental science that helps the advancing knowledge of the natural world, technology and aids in the other sciences and in our economy. Without the field of physics, the world today would be a complete mystery, everything would be different because of the significance physics has on our life as individuals and as a society.