Nobel winners have ‘Taylor Swift of physics’ day – 12/09/2023 – Science

It had been more than an hour since William Daniel Phillips, 75, surrounded by hundreds of university students, oscillated non-stop between sitting and standing in the auditorium of the IFSC (Institute of Physics of São Carlos, linked to USP).

Standing, he took selfies with the students and spoke briefly to each of them, despite his voice worn out by a cold. Sitting down, he signed textbooks, periodic tables, cell phone cases and even plastic mugs – everyone wanted the signature of a Nobel laureate, after all.

I note that he must be exhausted by this transformation into the Taylor Swift of physics. “It would be better if I had the same number of zeros as her in my bank account,” he jokes. Phillips remained there until the last student, invariably courteous.

The American researcher (winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997) and his colleague and fellow countryman David Wineland, 79 (who received his own Nobel Prize in 2012), visited the interior of São Paulo for two days of lectures this week.

The duo are old acquaintances and collaborators of researchers at USP in São Carlos since before they became famous. “In fact, the only scientific article that these two signed together was written during a stay here”, observed Vanderlei Bagnato, professor at IFSC-USP, when presenting Phillips’ lecture.

On the auditorium stage, the styles of the two could not be more contrasting: Wineland, tremendously shy, does not skimp on the equations, while Phillips is the good-natured grandfather, handing out small prizes to everyone who found the courage to ask a question (“please call him Bill”, he insisted).

In common, in addition to the tieback wave, the two have a career dedicated to understanding the behavior of individual atoms, with different applications.

Phillips was awarded by the Nobel committee for his work on so-called laser cooling, in which light rays cool atoms, making them slower and therefore more studyable. “I’d love to be able to use laser cooling here, by the way, because the air conditioning isn’t up to the task,” he joked, referring to the packed auditorium.

Wineland, who also works on cooling atoms, won the award for his contribution to the field of quantum computing, which seeks to use the properties of elementary particles to perform tasks that challenge current computers.

The work of both researchers, moreover, has brought important contributions to the area of ​​metrology — the ability to measure any magnitude of nature, such as the passage of time, distance and mass (or, popularly, weight) of objects, with accuracy. It is no coincidence that both are linked to the US National Institute of Standards and Technology – equivalent, in a way, to Inmetro in Brazil.

This was the center of Phillips’ speech, who said that the main objective of scientists who work with metrology is to replace all arbitrary measurements —defined only by human conventions— with something that has to do with a constant property of nature.

Today, for example, the SI (International System of Units) defines the meter based on the speed of light, which is a constant in the Universe and travels almost 300 million meters per second. The definition of second comes from the frequency of light waves emitted in energy transitions of atoms of the chemical element cesium. The luminous frequency corresponds to the repetition of light waves over time – hence the definition of second.

At least for now, Phillips told Sheet while enjoying an açaí. “Everyone agrees that we need a new definition for the second of the International System, because the precision using cesium atoms is not going to get much better than it already is,” she explains. “David’s work has gone further.” “True,” Wineland agreed, “but it’s not yet clear what will replace the old standard.”

During his talk, Phillips repeatedly mentions the elegance and beauty of adopting measurement standards that are not human conventions but are derived directly from nature. I ask whether, in science, beauty is often a sure indication that a theory must be true.

“Well, truth is not always beauty and beauty is truth. But one thing that comes to mind is the disagreement between Galileo and the Catholic Church. Galileo defended Copernicus’ astronomical system, which had circular orbits and the Sun in the center, although he was still unable to predict phenomena more accurately than the old system. Even so, faced with the elegance of the Copernican system, which did not have the frills of the old system, Galileo decided to take the risk of defending it . So sometimes beauty is an important indicator of the value of an idea.”

Despite citing Galileo, generally seen as a symbol of an inevitable conflict between science and religion, Phillips says he never had problems reconciling his Christian faith (of Methodist confession) with physics. “I never felt like I had to choose between one thing and another. For me, biblical texts always seemed to have a spiritual meaning, not a literal one.” Today, he is a member of the Vatican Academy of Sciences (with San Carlos host Vanderlei Bagnato among his colleagues).

Jokingly, he summarizes the fact that he chose physics as his area of ​​study as follows: “I was a very curious child, and adults couldn’t take that curiosity away from me. I wanted to be a scientist, but biology seemed like a business to me.” kind of disgusting; chemistry had a complicated nomenclature to memorize, and my memory is terrible. With physics, it was enough to know half a dozen formulas.”

He says he will do his best to ensure that inclusion in the category of Nobel laureates does not go to his head. “The problem with the ‘Nobel crap’, as Richard Feynman said [também físico e ganhador do prêmio, em 1965] It’s you thinking that people need to voice their opinion on everything. And that’s not the case.”