NicoleYunger Halpern

Thanks to student Krzysztof of David Cassidy's group for the most efficient lab tour I've ever had! Cooling positrons sufficiently to form positronium requires multiple stages and techniques...somehow even involving the two desktop fans you can see to Krzysztof's right.

Looks like Jeremy Bentham isn't taking visitors today. The pub named after him is, however.

I'm giving a seminar at the David Potter Institute at UCL this Thurs. at 12:30. Stop by if you'd like to hear about quantum thermodynamics for lattice gauge theories! Feel free to bring your lunch. Thanks to @postquantum for hosting! ucl.ac.uk/mathematical-p…

It's now obvious what dessert I'll be bringing home from Cambridge, UK for my Thermodynamics Lunch group.

Rudy Marcus had more enthusiasm for science than almost anyone else I've known. He was 91 years old when I met him. @Caltech quantumfrontiers.com/2026/09/27/mar…

Matthias Christandl @NewtonInstitute: "What to speak about in the age of AI?" One might as well ask instead, "What to speak about in the age of younger, stronger colleagues?" Partial answer: your perspective...and results you developed with stronger colleagues. @christandl_m

I keep trying to say "Brown noise" and end up saying "Brownian noise." #onetrackmind

Ran into a colleague @FitzMuseum_UK on Sunday afternoon.

The (old) Cavendish Laboratory @Cambridge_Uni, the site of many an experiment studied in undergrad modern-physics courses. In one such course, I was thrilled to redo the experiment from which J. J. Thomson inferred the electron's charge-to-mass ratio. @DeptofPhysics

Student JJ Thio imitates Paul Dirac not only by discussing quantum theory over dinner at St. John's, Cambridge, but also in his choice of mathematical tool. Unlike in Dirac's time, though, magic is on the menu today. quantumfrontiers.com/2026/09/20/qua…

Lots of quasiprobabilities, Fisher information, and algorithms: quantum foundations do underlie and enable technologies. Thanks to @GirtonCollege and @ParticulateDave for hosting a thought-provoking conference at Cambridge!

An artist came to last week's quantum conference @GirtonCollege, and she created a piece from my talk! Does this work look like arxiv.org/abs/2601.20952 to you?

The last time Juan Maldacena presented a colloquium at my home institution, @preskill introduced him...including by dancing the Maldacena---ahem, the Macarena---a craze that swept the world during the 1990s. How I wish I had a video.

I now agree with @QuantumAephraim that the most productive physicist in the photo, as measured in terms of discoveries about the natural world, is the individual lying on the floor. @GirtonCollege

Delighted to be spending the week in one of the most steampunk areas of Cambridge: @GirtonCollege, founded in 1869 for women ahead of their time. Thanks to @ParticulateDave for hosting!

Lots of Gibbs sampling, tensor networks, thermalization, and barriers thereunto. Thanks to the @NewtonInstitute for a lively "Dynamics of entanglement" conference!

Me: How many guides of punting tours are female?
Guide of punting tour: Not many. We just don't receive many applications.
Me: Funny, that's what I hear from physics departments.

Disappointingly, it sells glasses frames. (Any connection to @dr_qubit ?)

Not even @Perimeter have I seen a chalkboard in the bathroom. @NewtonInstitute

How can quantum particle statistics help—or hinder—Maxwell’s demon, and what are the latest experimental updates about this prediction? I enjoyed talking with science writer Lakshmi Chandrasekharan about quantum thermodynamics, creative writing and more. scieye.wordpress.com/2026/08/20/a-c…