Fundamental physics with cold radioactive atoms

The metaphor that fundamental physics is concerned to say what the natural world is like at the deepest level may be cashed out in terms of entities, properties, or laws. The role of quantum field theories in the Standard Model of high-energy physics suggests that fundamental entities, properties, and laws are to be sought in these theories. But the contextual ontology proposed in Chapter 12 would support no unified compositional structure for the world; a quantum state assignment specifies no physical property distribution sufficient even to determine all physical facts; and quantum theory posits no fundamental laws of time evolution, whether deterministic or stochastic. Quantum theory has made a revolutionary contribution to fundamental physics because its principles have permitted tremendous unification of science through the successful application of models constructed in conformity to them: but these models do not say what the world is like at the deepest level.

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Production and Relevance

10.1093/oso/9780198779711.003.0007 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Stuart Glennan

Keyword(s):

Causal Relevance ◽

Fundamental Physics ◽

Causal Chains

This chapter offers an account of mechanistic production, which is contrasted with Salmon and Dowe’s theory of physical production. It provides a new analysis of the nature of events, and an account of how those events can form productive causal chains. This account identifies three distinct kinds of production: constitutive, precipitating, and chained. The chapter shows how the New Mechanist account addresses a number of standard problems for theories of causation, and for mechanistic theories in particular. These include how mechanistic production could be grounded in fundamental physics, how productive theories can explain causation by omission, prevention, and disconnection, how to explain causal relevance without appeal to counterfactuals, and how to understand the relation between production and constitution in inter-level causal claims. The chapter concludes by discussing how the New Mechanist approach to causation and constitution leads to a sensible account of the nature and limits of reduction and emergence.

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Microcavities

10.1093/oso/9780198782995.001.0001 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 52

Author(s):

Alexey V. Kavokin ◽

Jeremy J. Baumberg ◽

Guillaume Malpuech ◽

Fabrice P. Laussy

Keyword(s):

Quantum Wells ◽

Strong Light ◽

Fundamental Physics ◽

Postgraduate Students ◽

Optical Cavities ◽

Semiconductor Quantum Wells ◽

Exciton Polaritons ◽

Different Types ◽

Potential Applications ◽

Experimental Findings

Both rich fundamental physics of microcavities and their intriguing potential applications are addressed in this book, oriented to undergraduate and postgraduate students as well as to physicists and engineers. We describe the essential steps of development of the physics of microcavities in their chronological order. We show how different types of structures combining optical and electronic confinement have come into play and were used to realize first weak and later strong light–matter coupling regimes. We discuss photonic crystals, microspheres, pillars and other types of artificial optical cavities with embedded semiconductor quantum wells, wires and dots. We present the most striking experimental findings of the recent two decades in the optics of semiconductor quantum structures. We address the fundamental physics and applications of superposition light-matter quasiparticles: exciton-polaritons and describe the most essential phenomena of modern Polaritonics: Physics of the Liquid Light. The book is intended as a working manual for advanced or graduate students and new researchers in the field.

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