3pm - 4pm
Thursday 15 October 2020
Harnessing biosystems for quantum information science
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Abstract
It is well known that architectures for quantum sensing and quantum information processing require exceptional isolation from sources of decoherence, including electromagnetic and thermal noise, by shielding and cooling. Could robust room-temperature alternatives be envisioned using biosystems that are optimized for certain quantum processes in warm, wet, and wiggly environments? We will explore in this seminar a number of collective and cooperative effects that can provide mechanisms to enhance coherent phenomena at multiple scales, including superradiance, optomechanical pumping far from equilibrium, many-body dispersion, and spin filtering through chiral molecules. Such exciton, phonon, plasmon, magnon, and other quantized effects may be exploited to develop novel platforms for quantum biosensing, opening avenues for the tantalizing realization of a test-tube quantum biocomputer and advanced biomedical diagnostics and therapeutics.
Speaker
Philip Kurian
Principal Investigator and Founding Director, Quantum Biology Laboratory, Howard University
Biography
Philip Kurian was born in Charleston, South Carolina. He is a theoretical physicist, natural philosopher, translational scientist, and principal investigator and founding director of the Quantum Biology Laboratory at Howard University. Dr. Kurian is the recipient of awards from the U.S.-Italy Fulbright Commission, Oak Ridge and Argonne Leadership Computing Facilities, Whole Genome Science Foundation, UK-based Guy Foundation, and the U.S. NIH. He serves as the principal investigator for a federal study examining how water mediates electrodynamic correlations between biomolecules, and as co-PI for the conceptualization of an NSF "quantum leap" challenge institute to develop novel platforms for quantum sensing and information processing in complex biological environments. Dr. Kurian’s vision is to uncover how fundamentally quantum interactions can produce biological manifestations at the mesoscopic and clinical scales, including in neurodegeneration, cancer, immunodiversity, oxidative metabolism, and human consciousness. As a board member for the AAAS Science for Seminaries program, Dr. Kurian also advises seminary professors on how to integrate frontier science topics into theological conversations.
About the Quantum Biology Laboratory
With a transformative vision that extends from the subatomic to the clinical scale, the QBL studies how collective behaviors in living matter can be manifested, controlled, and exploited for the development of advanced tools, diagnostics, and therapies to address neurodegenerative, oncological, immunological, and oxidative metabolic disorders. Investigators in the QBL use tools from theoretical physics, condensed matter, quantum optics, molecular biology, biochemistry, genomics, spectroscopy, and high-performance computing to solve an array of problems relevant to human disease processes and clinical medicine. The QBL is now hiring for a postdoctoral research associate.