A group of researchers in the UK has shown that it is possible to build a refrigerator using just two quantum particles (or even just one) in order to cool another quantum particle. They believe that such a device could be exploited in nanotechnology and that versions of it may even exist in nature.

Full story available at physicsworld.com

 

First CHIST-ERA Joint Transnational Call
 

The 1st call for proposals within the ERA-Net CHIST-ERA (European Coordinated Research on Long term Challenges in Information and Communication Sciences and Technologies) is open.

Call deadline: 5th of November 2010, 17:00 GMT

CHIST-ERA is looking for highly innovative and multidisciplinary projects in ICST; and is open to new ideas and original solutions, involving interdisciplinary skills in order to strenghten a broader community in the merging of their understanding and their questioning. In addition, the transformative research done in CHIST-ERA will explore new topics with potential for significant scientific and technical impacts. In the first call, two completely different topics are addressed:

 

1. Quantum Information Foundations and Technologies (QIFT)

2. Beyond Autonomic Systems - the Challenge of Consciousness (BASCC)

Research project consortia are invited to submit transnational proposals electronically on www.chistera.eu (the submission area will be made available by mid-September).  At the same time, every partner in the project has to bear in mind the specific local application rules/requirements of each national funding organisation. Therefore it is strongly recommended to contact your National Contact Point. The Call Announcement and the official templates for the fulfilment of proposals are available on www.chistera.eu. Moreover, the CHIST-ERA website provides a tool for submitting Expressions of Interest, and to search and find collaborative partners for common projects (available by mid-September).

 

CHIST-ERA Call Secretariat

Mathieu Girerd

French National Research Agency (ANR)

0033 1 7354 8213

mathieu [dot] girerd [at] agencerecherche [dot] fr

The European Commission has sent us the official approval to our request to add the Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz (JOGU Mainz) among the AQUTE partners, following the move of Professor Ferdinand Schimdt-Kaler from Ulm to Mainz.

In the new Commission ICT Work Programme 2011-2012 there is a new call (with deadline December the 2nd 2010) for Coordination and Support Actions designed to identify FET-Flagship Candidate (if you don't know what a FET-Flagship is a good place to start from is here).

Click on the tab below to read the Objective full text as it appears in the WP.

Objective ICT-2011.9.5: FET Flagship Initiative Preparatory Actions

FET Flagship Initiatives are science-driven, large-scale, multidisciplinary research initiatives oriented towards a unifying goal and nucleated from ICT future and emerging technologies. The goals of such initiatives should be visionary and highly ambitious, requiring cooperation among a range of scientific disciplines and research topics going beyond the ICT programme. FET Flagship Initiatives are envisioned to be long term programmes on a scale much beyond current FET Proactive Initiatives. The overarching nature and magnitude implies that they can only be realised through a federated effort of key stakeholders, building on European excellence. Specific aspects to consider are:

• Mission: the unifying goal should be a clearly formulated and broadly accepted long term vision involving major challenges in science and technology, requiring a large federated effort, and justified via comparison with existing activities and state of the art
• Impact: a clear leverage effect, substantial progress and major innovation in science and technology; affecting competitiveness of European industry, society, governance and sustainability, considering potential ethical and legal implications
• Integration: an operational framework describing how relevant disciplines, stakeholders and resources will be brought together at European or larger scale, and how they can be efficiently coordinated under strong scientific leadership along a cohesive roadmap with reasonable milestones that mark valuable interim results.

Target Outcome

a) Complete design and description of a consolidated candidate FET Flagship Initiative, including assessment of feasibility in scientific, technical and financial terms, i.e. with a well-defined goal thoroughly justified in terms of scientific advance and impact, implementation plan, an operational framework, the identification of resources, maturity, capacity, clear evidence of commitment from key stakeholders (in particular scientific communities, Member States and Associated Countries, funding agencies and global partners) with adequate level of integration and identity of the supporting community, and the development of an integrative research agenda to enable the launch of a FET Flagship by 2013. The objective is to support in the order of 5-6 projects, with a maximum duration of 12 months, addressing this target outcome.

b) Provide support to the setup of candidate FET Flagships by coordination of common issues, e.g. establishment of common platforms to tackle frequent tasks or shared interests, promoting networking and structuring of communities, organisation of joint events etc. The objective is to support 1 project, with a funding in the order of EUR 1 million, addressing this target outcome.

Expected Impact

• A goal-driven, federated effort towards a challenging scientific or technological vision to generate European scientific leadership, and a strong potential for longer term technological innovation and economic exploitation.
• Involvement and commitment from key stakeholders.
• Launch of FET Flagship Initiatives that deliver through their implementation key benefits for science, technology, economy and society, and which will significantly contribute to the coordination of EU and national research programmes and initiatives.

Funding Scheme

CSA: The objective is to support in the order of 5-6 projects, with a maximum duration of 12 months, under target outcome a) and 1 project, with a funding in the order of EUR 1 million, under target outcome b).

Indicative Budget Distribution

EUR 10 million

Call

FP7-ICT-FET-F

 

The call details are available in our FP7 Relevant Calls section.

The Commission ICT Work-Programme 2011-2012 feature an interesting Objective under FET-Open, namely "Objective ICT-2011.9.4: International cooperation on FET research". This consist in a funding scheme that provides additional funding to existing grant for on-going FET IPs and STREPs ending at least 18 months after the submission date of the proposal (click on the tab below to access the full Objective text as published in the WP).

Objective ICT-2011.9.4: International cooperation on FET research

Target outcomes

This objective aims to increase and accelerate the impact of FET research projects by cooperating with non-EU partners of excellent global standing. It targets the extension of ongoing FET projects with complementary research activities in which collaboration with non-EU¹ research partners brings significant added value.

The research content is expected to focus on new activities that expand the research challenges and reinforce the impact of the ongoing project. The outcome of that research is expected to be made freely and openly available for the benefit of the research community.

Funding can be requested by the partners from the ongoing FET project and by the new non- EU research participants to cover the coordination and joint research activities necessary to complement the ongoing project. Proposals must be presented by the coordinator of the on- going project.

 

Expected Impact 

• Enhanced outcomes, global reach and impact of ongoing FET research projects through research collaboration with non-EU participants with complementary expertise;
• Research cooperation between world-class EU and non-EU researcher teams reinforced, thus facilitating the emergence of global alliances.

Funding scheme

Additional funding to existing grant for on-going FET² IP and STREP projects ending at least 18 months after the submission date of the proposal.

Indicative budget distribution

EUR 3 million³

Call

FP7-ICT-2011-C Proposals are continuously receivable until 12 March 2013. One-step submission and evaluation process and specific eligibility and evaluation criteria (see Appendix 5⁴).

¹ The new participating organisations cannot be located in EU Member States or in Associated Countries
² Ongoing projects selected under any of the FET objectives of the FP7 ICT Work Programmes
³ Indicative budget which is expected to be committed for successful proposals from the cut-off dates of 17/05/2011 up to and including 10/04/2012 (batch 11 to batch 13 included)
⁴ Proposals submitted to FET-Open Objective ICT-2011.9.4: International cooperation on FET research are subject to the following additional eligibility criteria: Proposals must be presented by the coordinator of an on-going FET IP or STREP project ending at least 18 months after the submission date of the proposal.

 

The call details are available in our FP7 Relevant Calls section.

The new ICT Work Programme 2011-2012 has been published on the CORDIS website (a copy for download is available also here), and QIPC is contemplated again amongst the FET Proactive Initiatives. 

The WP features the objective ICT-2011 9.9 "Quantum ICT including ERA-NET Plus" (click on the tab below to read the full text)

Objective ICT-2011 9.9: FET Proactive: Quantum ICT (QICT) including ERA-NET- Plus

The objective is to conceive theoretically and develop experimentally novel and powerful technological applications of quantum coherence and entanglement. In particular, projects should develop a conceptual platform for potentially disruptive technologies, advance their scope and breadth and speed up the process of bringing them from the lab to the real world.

Target outcomes
The results obtained should push forward the boundaries of our knowledge and ensure a constant progress in the quantum ICT area, in particular by

a) Demonstration of quantum simulators capable to operate on quantum many-particle systems and to simulate technologically relevant systems (e.g., coupled systems in condensed matter, new materials and chemical compounds).

b) Demonstration of hybrid systems linking different quantum bit realizations (e.g., by bridging atomic/molecular and optical systems with condensed matter systems). Possible devices include those that interconnect different qubit memories and quantum information carriers, and quantum repeaters.

c) Novel quantum devices exploiting entanglement and quantum coherence as a resource, such as quantum sensing, imaging, measurement and communication.

d) Enabling methods and technologies to support aforementioned outcomes (e.g., the control of coherent operations with many quantum bits in the experimental domain, or the search for new algorithms and protocols in the theoretical domain).

e) A joint call for proposals on QICT, to be funded through an ERA-NET-Plus action between national and/or regional grant programmes.

STREPs should address at least one of the research foci a)-d), IPs should address two or more.

Expected impact

• Significant technological achievements with higher performance and superior energy efficiency such as entanglement assisted sensors and metrology
• Better understanding of the dynamics of complex systems and phenomena and design of novel artificial materials with tailored properties through quantum simulators and computers
• Extending the distance of secure quantum links through quantum repeaters
• Closer cooperation and greater alignment between the participating national/regional research programmes through an ERA-NET-Plus action

Funding schemes

a)-d): STREP, IP; e): ERA-NET-Plus

Indicative budget distribution

a)-d): EUR 15 million e): EUR 7 million (Any funds remaining following the selection of an ERA-NET-Plus action will be transferred to IP/STREP actions under this Objective)

Call

FP7-ICT-2011-9

As it can be easily seen by comparing with the QUROPE Research Agenda (see here) elaborated by the QUROPE/QUIE2T Governing Board, all the feedback that has bee provided by our community has been accommodated in the final Commission text.

The budget is probably a bit below expectation, being 22 million € in total (15 million € for STREP/IPs and 7 million € for the ERA-NET+ initiative). Notice anyway that in case we are able to get a 7 million € ERA-NET+ in the field (which imply being able to gather 14 million € invested in the field by National funding agencies) the budget would inflate to 36 million €. Work in this direction (through the ERA-NET action CHIST-ERA) is already under progress.

On August 6 HP Labs' researcher Vinay Deolalikar sent the following letter to his fellows researchers in HP Labs:

"Dear Fellow Researchers,
I am pleased to announce a proof that P is not equal to NP, which is attached in 10pt and 12pt fonts

The proof required the piecing together of principles from multiple areas within mathematics. The major effort in constructing this proof was uncovering a chain of conceptual links between various fields and viewing them through a common lens. Second to this were the technical hurdles faced at each stage in the proof.

This work builds upon fundamental contributions many esteemed researchers have made to their fields. In the presentation of this paper, it was my intention to provide the reader with an understanding of the global framework for this proof. Technical and computational details within chapters were minimized as much as possible.

This work was pursued independently of my duties as a HP Labs researcher, and without the knowledge of others. I made several unsuccessful attempts these past two years trying other combinations of ideas before I began this work.

Comments and suggestions for improvements to the paper are highly welcomed.

Sincerely, Vinay Deolalikar

Principal Research Scientist
HP Labs
www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Vinay_Deolalikar"

The paper (so far, all the experts who have been asked gave this attempt the highest "apparent" rating they could) is available here (66 pages, pdf)

More discussion at Greg Backer's, Lipton's and Scott Aaronson's blog (who by the way adds an interesting bit at the end of the post). I would however love to see comments also on this web.

Update-I: Dirk Kipton and Ken Regan have written a long post summarizing four possible problems with the proof that have been already identified. Go and check it out here.

Update-II: Several reasons why the proof is wrong are discussed in Scott Aaronson's blog which has links to all relevant postings that can be found on the web.