Related papers: Quantum criticality
Fermi helped establish a new framework for understanding matter, based on quantum theory. This framework refines and improves traditional atomism in two crucial respects. First, the elementary constituents of matter belong to a very small…
Relativity and quantum mechanics are generalized by considering a finite limit for the smallest measurable distance. The value a of this quantum of length is unknown, but it is a universal constant, like c and h. It depends on the total…
Although implicit in the discovery of the Schwarzschild solution 40 years earlier, the issues raised by the theory of what are now known as black holes were so unsettling to physicists of Einstein's generation that the subject remained in a…
Until 1974, the study of black holes was under the hegemony of Einstein's general relativity. However, that same year, Stephen Hawking incorporated quantum theory and discovered that black holes have temperature, entropy, and evaporate.…
The theoretical model proposed by Einstein to describe the phononic specific heat of solids as a function of temperature consists the very first application of the concept of energy quantization to describe the physical properties of a real…
The interpretation of quantum mechanics has been discussed since this theme first was brought up by Einstein and Bohr. This article describes a proposal for a new foundation of quantum theory, partly drawing upon ideas from statistical…
This year marks the 100th anniversary of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity (1915-2015). The first nontrivial solution of the Einstein field equations was derived by Karl Schwarzschild in 1916. This Note will focus mainly on the…
Recent developments in the mathematical foundations of quantum mechanics have brought the theory closer to that of classical probability and statistics. On the other hand, the unique character of quantum physics sets many of the questions…
Objecting that Sommerfeld's quantum conditions refer to particular coordinates, Einstein proposes a canonically invariant rule. But even if the invariance is canonical, Einstein may have in mind a double \emph{configuration} space…
Heisenberg's breakthrough in his July 1925 paper that set in motion the development of Quantum Mechanics through subsequent papers by Born, Jordan, Heisenberg and also Dirac (from 1925 to 1927) is reexamined through a modern lens. In this…
Quantum mechanics, information theory, and relativity theory are the basic foundations of theoretical physics. The acquisition of information from a quantum system is the interface of classical and quantum physics. Essential tools for its…
Quantum criticality is the intriguing possibility offered by the laws of quantum mechanics when the wave function of a many-particle physical system is forced to evolve continuously between two distinct, competing ground states. This…
A hundred years ago, the quantum concept provoked a revolution in science and the search of a new conceptual basis for whole physics, as emphasized by Einstein. In this paper, I discuss the essential features of Planck's works in 1900 on…
On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the revolutionary contributions to physics by Einstein, I am happy to respond to a problem posed by him in 1905. He said: In this paper it will be shown that according to the…
In this homage to Einstein's 144th birthday we propose a novel quantization prescription, where the paths of a path-integral are not random, but rather solutions of a geodesic equation in a random background. We show that this change of…
Classical thermodynamics is unrivalled in its range of applications and relevance to everyday life. It enables a description of complex systems, made up of microscopic particles, in terms of a small number of macroscopic quantities, such as…
After the development of a self-consistent quantum formalism nearly a century ago, there ensued a quest to understand the often counterintuitive predictions of the theory. These endeavors invariably begin with the assumption of the "truth"…
The Dulong-Petit limiting law for the specific heats of solids, one of the first general results in thermodynamics, has provided Mendeleev with a powerful tool for devising the periodic table and gave an important support to Boltzmann's…
The cosmological constant was proposed 100 years ago in order to make the model of static Universe, imagined then by most scientists, possible. Today it is the main candidate for the physical essence causing the observed accelerated…
This is an article commissioned by the Spanish Physics Magazine ("Revista Espa\~nola de F\'isica") for the Centennial Anniversary of the discovery of General Relativity. The article reviews experimental and observational efforts to test…