My musings on physics and technologies

 The Quantum world is one of many mysteries. This world is governed by laws that don't seem to make any sense, but are proved to be true. What does quantum mean? And how is this connected to computing?  A close-up view of an IBM quantum computer. Source - Cnet.com Let's talk about each of these words individually first. Quantum, in layman's terms, means small. The mechanism or working of this subatomic world is governed by the rules of quantum mechanics. Let's understand some principles of quantum mechanics before talking about quantum computing. The quantum mechanical model of the atom, was the result of two important scientific advancements- Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle , and the dual behavior of matter proposed by de Broglie. To briefly explain these- de Broglie stated that every particle had wave nature, just as waves- like visible light- showed particle behavior. This dual behavior is particularly seen in smaller particles like electrons, and is negligib...

In the previous blog we discussed the death of various sized stars and concluded that the death of massive stars results in the birth of two of the most extreme bodies in our universe - neutron stars and black holes . Today we'll talk about neutron stars . Neutron star The death of massive stars (also called supernova) could make either black holes or neutron stars. When  s tars  four to eight times as massive as the sun explode in a violent supernova, their outer layers can blow off in an often-spectacular display, leaving behind a small, dense core that continues to collapse. Gravity presses the material in on itself so tightly that protons and electrons combine to make neutrons, yielding the name "neutron star." During the supernova, when the star implodes, particles like protons and electrons in the core, which really don't want to be close to each other, are forced to get close due to the mass of the star on top of it. These particles eventually fuse to become ne...

In the previous blog, we spoke about the birth of stars and how light was bought into our universe, which was merely an infant at that time. In this article we'll talk about the life of these stars and eventually, their fate after their long journey.. As you may remember, we discussed the birth and ignition of a star and we discussed nuclear fusion in detail as well. We also concluded with the sizes of stars, (small, medium and supermassive). What's next? How does different  size result in a different life and death of stars? We'll answer these questions and more in this blog. Small sized stars Small stars live a rather long and boring life. They live for hundreds of billions of years and are about quarter the mass of the sun (also called solar mass, which is  approximately 2×10 30  kg) . They start off as relatively cool and dim red dwarfs . As they age, their surface temperature increases and they become a blue dwarf . Eventually, as their light fades slowly, they cool...

     After the big bang for millions of years, the universe comprised mostly of helium and hydrogen. Darkness prevailed in this infant universe. There was no light in this universe, until the first stars were formed. In this blog, we'll talk about the life cycle of stars. In subsequent blogs we'll talk about black holes, and other mysterious objects in the universe.   The carina nebula, huge clouds which give rise to stars For millions of years the universe was enveloped in darkness with huge clouds of dust and gas forming and continuously expanding. These clouds grew to become so massive with significant mass that their force of gravity eventually caused it to collapse into itself.  It shrunk to form a extremely hot dense core with disks of matter spinning around it. As the cloud collapses, a dense, hot core forms and begins gathering dust and gas. Eventually, the core became so hot reaching approximately 15 million degrees , the particles of dust and gas got ...

We have discussed in the last 3 blogs the important building blocks of the Special Theory of Relativity, a key cornerstone for modern physics. In this concluding blog we will discuss mass energy unification, better known as  E=mc²   . Let's start off with a summary of some of the key concepts of the Special Theory of Relativity. Frames of Reference : Reference frames are - in simple terms - the place from where one makes observations . It could be the sofa you are sitting on. The important point on frames of reference is that there is no absolute frame of reference, in other words, no frame of reference is ever absolutely stationary,  i.e., motion is relative and everything is in motion with respect to something else. We also spoke about how the laws of motion were not applicable to light. The speed of light according to Einstein is a constant. The Postulates: There are two postulates or consequences of relativity. They are: The laws of physics hold tr...