Category Technology/Electronics

Molecular qubits can communicate at telecom frequencies

Grant Smith and Leah Weiss in Awschalom Lab
PhD students Leah Weiss (left) and Grant Smith work in the lab of Professor David Awschalom. (Photo by John Zich)

A team of scientists from the University of Chicago, the University of California Berkeley, Argonne National Laboratory, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has developed molecular qubits that bridge the gap between light and magnetism—and operate at the same frequencies as telecommunications technology. The advance, published today in Science, establishes a promising new building block for scalable quantum technologies that can integrate seamlessly with existing fiber-optic networks.

Because the new molecular qubits can interact at telecom-band frequencies, the work points toward future quantum networks—sometimes called the “quantum internet...

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Smart microfibers turn everyday objects into health care monitors and energy devices

Smart microfibres turn everyday objects into healthcare monitors and energy devices
Illustration of the microfibers in action, with uses in wearable breath and gas sensors, health monitoring, and energy conversion and electrodes. Credit: Andy Wang/University of Cambridge

New research led by the University of Cambridge, in collaboration with Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (GZ) and Queen Mary University of London, could redefine how we interact with everyday tools and devices—thanks to a novel method for printing ultra-thin conductive microfibers.

Imagine fibers thinner than a human hair (nano- to micro-scale in diameter) that can be tuned on-demand to add sensing, energy conversion and electronic connectivity capabilities to objects of different shapes and surface textures (such as glass, plastic and leather)...

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Smart blood: How AI reads your body’s aging signals

Smart blood: How AI reads your body's aging signals
Credit: npj Systems Biology and Applications (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41540-025-00580-4

Could a simple blood test reveal how well someone is aging? A team of researchers led by Wolfram Weckwerth from the University of Vienna, Austria, and Nankai University, China, has combined advanced metabolomics with cutting-edge machine learning and a novel network modeling tool to uncover the key molecular processes underlying active aging.

Their study, published in npj Systems Biology and Applications, identifies aspartate as a dominant biomarker of physical fitness and maps the dynamic interactions that support healthier aging.

It has long been known that exercise protects mobility and lowers the risk of chronic disease...

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Clearing significant hurdle to quantum computing

Harvard physicists working to develop game-changing tech demonstrate 3,000 quantum-bit system capable of continuous operation

One often-repeated example illustrates the mind-boggling potential of quantum computing: A machine with 300 quantum bits could simultaneously store more information than the number of particles in the known universe.

Now process this: Harvard scientists just unveiled a system that was 10 times bigger and the first quantum machine able to operate continuously without restarting.

In a paper published in the journal Nature, the team demonstrated a system of more than 3,000 quantum bits (or qubits) that could run for more than two hours, surmounting a series of technical challenges and representing a significant step toward building the super computers, wh...

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