3:30–4:30 pm ERC 161
Dan Carney (Berkeley National Lab) "The search for new physics at the quantum limits of measurement"
Progress in fundamental physics--the search for new particles, forces, and laws of nature--relies on probing regimes of nature that have not yet been explored. This requires continuous development of ultra-sensitive detectors. In recent years, a number of experimental programs have begun to operate with sufficient precision that they have become limited not by technical sources of noise but by the very laws of quantum mechanics. While these limits have some history in the atomic, molecular, and optics community, they are relatively new to the high energy theory landscape. I'll give an overview of how quantum mechanics places limits on measurement sensitivity, and highlight a few key examples where these limits are playing an increasingly important role, especially neutrino and dark matter physics.
About speaker: I am a theoretical physicist, originally trained in string theory-ish physics and now working near the theory-experiment intersection. I am a staff scientist at Berkeley National Lab (in terms of tenure, roughly equivalent to an assistant professor).
I use ideas from quantum information science to learn about fundamental physics. Most of my work is centered around the theory of measurement and how it applies to particle physics and gravity. This ranges from proposing new experiments (some of which are now real!) to more formal theoretical work.
Ultimately, I strongly suspect that quantum limits to measurement will play a central role in the formulation of a consistent quantum model of general relativity. In the meantime, many of these ideas have applications beyond fundamental physics, particularly to problems in quantum metrology and computing.
