From the Einstein-Bohr debate to a new quantum revolution: a public lecture at USI by Alain Aspect

What is matter really made of? Are physics and particles fully understood? Towards the end of the 19th century, the laws of classical physics seemed to explain in a comprehensive way the nature of the atom and its elements. Then, in the early 1900s, scientists began to understand how the issue were much more complex, laying the basis for what would become the first quantum revolution.

Today, however, though we have access to a technology capable of operating at near-atomic size, even those theoretical models are starting to falter, as they seem unable to explain every phenomena which we are now able to observe: it is perhaps time, like 100 years ago, for a new “quantum explanation”.

On Friday, October 7th, at 6pm in room A12 on the Lugano campus, USI and the International Balzan Prize Foundation will host Alain Aspect, the acclaimed French physicist regarded as one of the leading experts of quantum correlation between particles. During his public lecture (in English), Aspect shall explain what lies behind this paradigm, presenting the evolution of the scientific debate on the subject and involving the different views from leading physicists such as Podolsky, Rosen, Einstein, Schröder, Bohr, Bell and Aspect himself. The French physicist’s experiments on the “entanglement” of photons in fact are – according to a number of observers – opening the door to a second and new quantum revolution that could entail technological spillovers unthinkable until now.

--

Professor Aspect was awarded the Balzan Award in 2013 “For his pioneering experiments which led to a striking confirmation of Quantum Mechanics as opposed to local hidden-variable theories. His work has opened the way to the experimental control of entangled quantum states, the essential element of Quantum Information Processing.”

For further information: www.balzan.org/en/prizewinners/alain-aspect