Tag Archives: entropy
Dispelling Maxwell’s demon
Maxwell’s demon is one of the most famous thought experiments in the history of physics, a puzzle first posed in the 1860s that continues to shape scientific debates to this day. I’ve struggled to make sense of it for years. … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Scicomm, Science
Tagged arrow of time, Charles Bennett, decoherence, Dennis Gabor, entropy, information theory, James Clerk Maxwell, Leo Szilard, Léon Brillouin, Maxwell's demon, no-cloning theorem, quantum entanglement, quantum information, Quantum mechanics, Rolf Landauer, Schrödinger's cat, second law of thermodynamics, unitarity, wavefunction collapse
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Quantum clock breaks entropy barrier
In physics, the second law of thermodynamics says that a closed system tends to become more disordered over time. This disorder is captured in an entity called entropy. Many devices, especially clocks, are affected by this law because they need … Continue reading
Posted in Scicomm
Tagged coherent transport, dissipative transport, entropy, Hamiltonian, precision, quantum clock, quantum physics, second law of thermodynamics, spin chain, thermodynamic bias, thermodynamics, time reversal symmetry
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Why do quasicrystals exist?
Featured image: An example of zellij tilework in the Al Attarine Madrasa in Fes, Morocco (2012), with complex geometric patterns on the lower walls and a band of calligraphy above. Caption and credit: just_a_cheeseburger (CC BY) ‘Quasi’ means almost. It’s … Continue reading
Posted in Scicomm
Tagged crystallography, Dan Shechtman, density functional theory, DFT-FE, enthalpy, entropy, finite element analysis, fivefold symmetry, graphics processing unit, Linus Carl Pauling, nucleation, phase diagram, quasicrystals, scandium-zinc, surface energy, translational symmetry, unit cell, ytterbium-cadmium
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The Berry phase of Kancha Gachibowli
There’s a concept in quantum mechanics, and also in parts of classical mechanics, called the Berry phase. Say you’re walking around a mountain. You start off along a path and follow it all the way until you’re back to the … Continue reading
Posted in Op-eds, Scicomm
Tagged adiabatic process, afforestation, Berry phase, BR Gavai, deforestation, entropy, environment, ferromagnetism, Kancha Gachibowli, magnetic hysteresis, Supreme Court of India, Telangana
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The weekly linklist – July 25, 2020
I’ve decided to publish this linklist via Substack. Next weekend onwards, it will only be available on https://linklist.substack.com. And this is why the list exists and what kind of articles you can find in it. Want to buy a parrot? … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged augury, black holes, cyptomining, electromagnetic pulses, entropy, F-commerce, Facebook, Hope Mars mission, India water crisis, neutrinos, North Kosovo, nuclear explosion, reading, social network, Standard Model of particle physics, UAE
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Journalistic entropy
Say you need to store a square image 1,000 pixels wide to a side with the smallest filesize (setting aside compression techniques). The image begins with the colour #009900 on the left side and, as you move towards the right, … Continue reading
Posted in Analysis, Scicomm
Tagged conspiracy theories, coronavirus pandemic, COVID-19, entropy, fact-checking, false balance, health journalism, image compression, Indian Council of Medical Research, information theory, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Priyanka Pulla, pseudoscience, science journalism, thermodynamics, Washington Post
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Time and the pandemic
There is this idea in physics that the fundamental laws of nature apply the same way for processes moving both forwards and backwards in time. So you can’t actually measure the passage of time by studying these processes. Where does … Continue reading
Posted in Life notes, Science
Tagged arrow of time, climate change, clock time, coronavirus, coronavirus pandemic, COVID-19, entropy, eternity, herd immunity, new coronavirus, novel coronavirus, second law of thermodynamics, time, time symmetry
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A journey through Twitter and time, with the laws of physics
Say you’re in a dark room and there’s a flash. The light travels outward in all directions from the source, and the illumination seems to expand in a sphere. This is a visualisation of how the information contained in light … Continue reading
Posted in Scicomm
Tagged B0 meson, Big Bang cosmology, CPT symmetry, entropy, hypersurface, light cones, particle physics, special theory of relativity, time, time reversal symmetry, Twitter, weak nuclear force
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