Talks

We discuss some applications of a result on the convex combination of the quantum states (that we refer to as convex-split technique) and its variants. In the framework of Quantum Resource theory, we provide an operational way of characterizing the amount of resource in a given quantum state, for a large class of resource theories. Our results use the convex-split technique in the achievability proof, with a matching converse in the one-shot setting.  Building upon the ideas involved in this achievability proof, we show how the technique (and its close counterpart of position-based decoding) can lead to a large family of entanglement-assisted protocols for quantum communication. We sketch close connections between these protocols and the port-based teleportation scheme of Ishizaka and Hiroshima [Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 240501]. We exploit these connections to obtain a new protocol for entanglement assisted point to point quantum channel coding in the asymptotic and i.i.d. setting, with the rate of entanglement cost and achievable communication matching that of Bennett et. al. [IEEE Trans. Inf. Theory, 48, 2002].  Based on the works arXiv:1410.3031,  arXiv:1708.00381,   arXiv:1702.01940.

In his classic essay, “The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge,” Abraham Flexner, the founding director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the man who helped bring Albert Einstein to the United States, describes a great paradox of scientific research. The search for answers to deep questions, motivated solely by curiosity and without concern for applications, often leads not only to the greatest scientific discoveries  but also the most revolutionary technological breakthroughs. In short, no quantum mechanics, no computer chips. Robbert Dijkgraaf, the Institute’s current director, explains how Flexner’s defense of the value of “the unobstructed pursuit of useless knowledge” may be even more relevant today than it was in the early twentieth century. Dijkgraaf describes how basic research has led to major transformations in the past century and explains why it is an essential precondition of innovation and the first step in social and cultural change.

The Standard Model of particle physics and its implications for cosmology leave several fundamental questions unanswered, including the strong CP problem and the origins of neutrino masses, dark matter, and dark energy. Previous directions of model building beyond the Standard Model have usually focused on new high-energy physics. As an alternative direction, we have developed a class of low-energy neutrino mass and axion models at a new infrared gravitational scale, which is numerically coincident with the scale of dark energy. In this seminar, I will present this novel class of models and expand on the aspect of gravitational neutrino mass generation. My talk will also cover the wide-ranging cosmological and phenomenological model predictions, in particular the invalidity of the cosmological neutrino mass bound, enhanced neutrino decays, and soft topological defects. 

In both Causal Set Quantum Gravity as well as in the String Landscape, we face the challenging tasks of sifting through large state spaces and searching for the set of solutions which best model our physical universe. I demonstrate in this talk how efficient parallel algorithms can give us access to areas of physics previously unstudied due to computational barriers. I first present new methods to accelerate the evolution of causal set Markov chains, which enables us to look for the spontaneous emergence of manifoldlike structure. Then, I use a similar graph theoretic approach to show how a dynamic vacuum selection mechanism naturally emerges in F-Theory and Type IIB String Theory in the context of eternal inflation. We will discuss in detail relevant numerical aspects, including practical limitations and algorithms from graph theory, and how machine learning can be used in future work.