Novel Test of Quantum Mechanics Proposed

Harvard's pioneering quantum theorist, Wendell Furry, suggested that quantum paradoxes might be explained if separated particles experienced decoherence. However, this idea has never been tested. These ideas are more important now, as quantum theory is now probed ever more deeply.

In their recent Physical Review Letter, CQOS theoretical physicists Simon Kiesewetter, Run Yan Teh, Peter Drummond and Margaret Reid, have calculated that this idea is now testable in recently developed experiments based on the technology of quantum optomechanics.

While such tests are challenging, they are feasible in cryogenic experiments where massive optomechanical systems can be cooled to their ground state. The proposal is to use such devices as a quantum memory for entangled quantum states to test the Furry hypothesis for the first time.

See Link:

Pulsed Entanglement of Two Optomechanical Oscillators and Furry's Hypothesis
S. Kiesewetter, R.Y. Teh, P.D. Drummond, and M.D. Reid
Physical Review Letters 119, 023601 (2017)