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Science Friday

Quantum Leaps, Cancer Drugs, Cat Cameras. June 7, 2019, Part 2

Science Friday

Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Natural Sciences, Wnyc, Science, Friday, Life Sciences

4.46.3K Ratings

🗓️ 7 June 2019

⏱️ 47 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The “spooky physics” of the quantum world has long been marked by two key ideas: The idea of superposition, meaning that a quantum particle can exist in multiple states simultaneously, and the idea of randomness, meaning that it’s impossible to predict when certain quantum transitions will take place. Writing in the journal Nature, Zlatko Minev and colleagues report that they may be able to make the quantum behavior slightly less mysterious. Minev joins Ira to talk about the finding, and what new directions it might open up in quantum research. For patients whose cancer has metastasis, the options can be limited. While new drugs are being developed, they are often only approved for a specific subset or stage of cancer—sometimes even a specific age group. However, researchers are looking to expand on a pool of patients that can get these new drugs. Dr. Sara Hurvitz, the director of the Breast Cancer Research Program at UCLA, joins Ira to talk about how a drug that was approved for breast cancer in postmenopausal women may soon be available for younger patients. Plus, Dr. Neeraj Agarwal, the director of the Genitourinary Oncology Program, to talk about a new treatment option for patients with metastatic prostate cancer. If you want the real scoop on what your cat is doing while you’re away, researchers are studying that very question, using cat cameras. Our feline friends spend quite a lot of time outside of our line of sight, and we imagine them napping, bathing, playing, hunting. But that’s merely speculation. To get the data, researchers need to catch them in the act. Maren Huck, Senior Lecturer at the University of Derby in the UK, recently published a methodological study where she successfully tracked the movements of 16 outdoor domestic cats to find out what they were up to. She joins Ira to discuss the findings, which she published in the journal Applied Animal Behavior Science. Plus, cat behavior specialist and University California Davis Veterinary School researcher Mikel Delgado joins the conversation to talk more about catching cat behavior on camera, and what we can learn from recording their secret lives.

Transcript

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0:00.0

This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato.

0:02.9

Later in the hour, we'll be talking about new advances in cancer drugs and what your cats do when you're not there.

0:10.6

But first, the spooky physics of the quantum world has long been marked by two key ideas.

0:18.2

There's the idea of superpositioning, meaning that a quantum particle can exist in multiple

0:23.6

states simultaneously, and the idea of randomness, meaning that it's impossible to predict where certain

0:31.3

quantum transitions will take place. But now researchers say that they may be able to make the

0:37.2

quantum behavior slightly less

0:39.4

mysterious. By using a sensitive form of continuous monitoring, they have been able to identify

0:45.4

signs that a quantum leap is imminent in an artificial atom. The timing of the leap is still

0:51.1

completely random. The researchers cannot predict when it will happen, but they do get a warning flag of an upcoming jump a few microseconds before it occurs.

1:02.2

Let me introduce my guests who will explain it.

1:04.8

Slackomenev is a research scientist at IBM quantum computing in Yorktown Heights, New York.

1:10.9

He did his work as part of his postdoctoral dissertation at Yale, published this week in the journal Nature.

1:17.3

Welcome to Science Friday, Dr. Minniff.

1:20.2

Ira, it's a pleasure to be on Science Friday.

1:22.4

It's our pleasure to have you.

1:23.7

Thank you.

1:24.8

Set this scene for us.

1:26.1

What is a quantum leap? That's a great question.

1:31.8

Well, that goes back to the very founding of quantum physics and Boar's ideas that in quantum physics,

1:39.0

unlike in classical physics, the energy of an atom can only take discrete levels. For instance, it can only

1:48.0

be measured to ever be zero, one, two, or three. And it can never be, so to speak, in the

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