Quantum algorithm breakthrough: Performs a true calculation for the first time

Feb. 24, 2013 ? An international research group led by scientists from the University of Bristol, UK, and the University of Queensland, Australia, has demonstrated a quantum algorithm that performs a true calculation for the first time. Quantum algorithms could one day enable the design of new materials, pharmaceuticals or clean energy devices.

The team implemented the 'phase estimation algorithm' -- a central quantum algorithm which achieves an exponential speedup over all classical algorithms. It lies at the heart of quantum computing and is a key sub-routine of many other important quantum algorithms, such as Shor's factoring algorithm and quantum simulations.

Dr Xiao-Qi Zhou, who led the project, said: "Before our experiment, there had been several demonstrations of quantum algorithms, however, none of them implemented the quantum algorithm without knowing the answer in advance. This is because in the previous demonstrations the quantum circuits were simplified to make it more experimentally feasible. However, this simplification of circuits required knowledge of the answer in advance. Unlike previous demonstrations, we built a full quantum circuit to implement the phase estimation algorithm without any simplification. We don't need to know the answer in advance and it is the first time the answer is truly calculated by a quantum circuit with a quantum algorithm."

Professor Jeremy O'Brien, director of the Centre for Quantum Photonics at the University of Bristol said: "Implementing a full quantum algorithm without knowing the answer in advance is an important step towards practical quantum computing. It paves the way for important applications, including quantum simulations and quantum metrology in the near term, and factoring in the long term."

The research is published in Nature Photonics.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Bristol.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. Xiao-Qi Zhou, Pruet Kalasuwan, Timothy C. Ralph, Jeremy L. O'Brien. Calculating unknown eigenvalues with a quantum algorithm. Nature Photonics, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nphoton.2012.360

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/matter_energy/physics/~3/lS3QlmN33kQ/130224142829.htm

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Jordan's the goal hero for Woodcote Stoke Row in Reading Football League

Reading Football League round-up

Senior Division

Dean Jordan came off the bench to secure a 3-2 win for Woodcote Stoke Row against a South Reading side which finished with nine men.

Andy Bullett and James Hancock were also on target for the visitors before Jordan, a 72nd-minute substitute, grabbing the winner five minutes from time.

Ryan Adams and Brett Rann replied for South Reading.

But Adams was later sent off following two yellow cards, while Ryan Kingsbeer also saw red.

South Reading?s next game is against Marlow United in a showdown between the current leaders and last season?s champions.

Marlow warmed up with a 4-1 win over bottom club Rotherfield United.

Rotherfield took a shock lead with a penalty from Ricky Sidhu after striker Ben Keable had been impeded when going for a cross.

On their own admission, Marlow were below par even though the scoreline suggests otherwise and they struggled to gain a foothold in the game.

They even needed assistance to score their equaliser when Rotherfield defender Guy Bickerton rose to head clear a cross in the 34th minute from James Flint?s cross, but inadvertently sent it inside a post for an own goal.

Mitchel Woodward put United in front soon after the break but it was not until the 84th minute that they really surged ahead. Adam Dickens gained possession and ran 40 yards before slotting the ball past the keeper to notch his 30th goal of the season, making him the highest scorer in the division.

Jonathan Mason took until the third minute of injury-time to register Marlow?s fourth goal to give a flattering look to the scoreline.

Reading YMCA had Jonathan Adey to thank for scoring twice as they beat Theale convincingly 4-1.

Andrew Tipper and substitute Kieron Mabbutt were also on the scoresheet, while Theale sub Keyron Hylton replied on the hour mark.

Mortimer, in fourth place, were involved in a tensely fought encounter with Taplow United and finally grabbed the game?s only goal through Michael Davies, just five minutes from time.

Unity were beaten 4-1 by Sandhurst Devels with goals from Thomas Copper, David Evans, Mark Farrell and Tom Wilde.

REME Arborfield are third in the Premier Division after a home walkover win against Ashridge Park who could not raise a team.

Divisions 1 and 2

Chris Waring?hit six goals as Winnersh Rangers inflicted a remarkable 10-2 defeat on Division 1 leaders Sonning.

Sonning started confidently enough with Nick Newell heading them in front after only five minutes and he added another 10 minutes later when he drove in from 18 yards.

But with several players missing through work commitments and injuries, they were soon stopped in their tracks by a goal avalanche from Rangers.

Waring was their chief destroyer, hitting a double hat-trick and Tom Slade added another two goals.

Ethan Jerrome and Andrew Haskins, just after the break, increased Sonning?s misery by getting on the scoresheet.

Woodley Town A, in third place, similarly hammered Wargrave 5-0.

Danny Isaiew and Andrew Dawe scored in the first half with Jake Brooks, substitute David Logan and Jordan Sawyer completing the rout.

Division 2 leaders Woodley Hammers came off best in a 10-goal thriller away to Wokingham & Emmbrook A.

Hammers? goals in a 6-4 win came from Kevin Brown (2), George Hepburn and Jamie Smith.

Royal Albion travelled to Twyford & Ruscombe and after a close-fought game edged home by the solitary goal.

Also in Division 2, Frilsham & Yattendon Res beat Taplow United Res 3-2.

Divisions 3 and 4

Matthew Williamson marked his return from injury with a hat-trick for Eldon Celtic in their 5-0 Division 3 win over lowly Sonning Sports.

He had been out for a month through injury.

James Edwards also scored while Joseph Carroll celebrated his debut with a fine strike.

Table toppers Emmbrook narrowly beat bottom club The Hop Leaf 2-1 after struggling to hit their best form.

In the reverse fixture, Emmbrook had won 13-1 but this time they allowed Hop Leaf to take an early lead before Keiran Painter and Rob Sherwood, three minutes from time, snatched victory.

AFC Corinthians Res also had a convincing 4-1 win, this time away to Sonning A for whom John Naylor hit a consolation.

David Givens scored Corinthians? with an audacious 40-yard lob.

Darren Russell added their second with a tidy finish.

A Sonning defender diverted a cross into his own goal for their third and a Robin Shaw header rounded things off.

Leaders Royal Oranje beat FC Winnersh 5-1 in Divison 4.

A Matt Bacon hat-trick and further goals from William Day and Alistair Drury made up their total.

Sam Randle netted a penalty for Winnersh.

White Eagles?blasted 14 goals without reply past The Hop Leaf Res with Mateusz Krochmal, Jarek Michalowski, Adrian Zarnowski and Krzysztof Cymek all scoring twice while Pawel Swiderski hit a hat-trick. Other goals came from Krystian Januszkiewisc, Bartos Mietlicki and Mariusz Salanski.

SRCC crushed AFC Corinthians 8-3 with goals coming from Adam Williams (4), Oliver Windiate, Darren Windiate and a Sam Jordan penalty.

Substitute Martin Clifford hit two for Shinfield Village who beat Woodley Hammers res 4-3.

Stuart Clarke and Dwayne Goswell got their other goals.

Cup round-up

Josh Blackwood grabbed a hat-trick for Highmoor Ibis Res who comfortably dispatched Mortimer Res from the Reading Junior Cup, winning 5-0.

Christopher Gerrard netted their first goal after 17 minutes and Sanchez Cammock made it 2-0 just five minutes later.

Goalkeeper Elton Cristophe performed well in keeping a clean sheet.

And Blackwood?s treble sealed the convincing win.

Woodley Town Res travelled to Pinewood in the same competition and things looked gloomy for them when they went 2-0 down as Darryn Alexander netted a goal in either half for the home side.

But Duncan Cantwell began the fightback and Connor Cregan equalised to take the game into extra-time.

Pinewood went on the attack and were pressing for a winner in the second period of extra-time when a breakaway saw Cantwell race clear.

His cross was driven into the net by Tim Green with virtually the last kick of the match to grab a 3-2 victory for Town.

Sandhurst Devels found Premier Divison leaders Newbury Town Res far too strong for them, putting up a brave fight before losing 9-1.

Christopher Evans netted Devels? only goal.

Daniel Crane and Elliott Paul led the charge for Newbury, both scoring twice, with other goals netted by Gary Dredge, Carl Jenner, James Doherty and substitute Albert Benton.

Rotherfield United Res knocked out Westwood United Res by a 3-1 margin.

Paul Langham set the ball rolling by scoring in the 10th minute for Rotherfield. Craig Oatham netted on the hour and 10 minutes later Paul Arthur completed their scoring.

Westwood?s goal came from a penalty converted by Daniel Nicholson.

Cookham Dean had an easy passage in the Norfolkian Senior Cup, hammering Walters Leisure, from the Wycombe and District League, 7-1 with Jonathan Schaaf hitting a hat-trick.

Xavier Etienne added two, while Sean Gavagan and Paul Sharpe also scored.

Source: http://www.getreading.co.uk/sport/football/goalpost/s/2128901_jordans_the_goal_hero_for_woodcote_stoke_row_in_reading_football_league

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Professor discovers how new corals species form in the ocean

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Since the observations made by English naturalist Charles Darwin on the Galapagos Islands, researchers have been interested in how physical barriers, such as isolation on a particular island, can lead to the formation of new species through the process of natural selection. Natural selection is a process whereby heritable traits that enhance survival become more common in successive generations, while unfavorable heritable traits become less common. Over time, animals and plants that have morphologies or other attributes that enhance their suitability to a particular environment become more common and more adapted to that specific environment.

Researchers today are intimately familiar with how physical barriers and reproduction isolation can lead to the formation of new species on land, especially among plants and animals with short generation times such as insects and annual plants. Michael E. Hellberg, associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at LSU, however, is interested in a more obscure form of speciation: the speciation of animals in the ocean.

"Marine plants and animals can drift around in the ocean extremely long distances," Hellberg said. "So how do they specialize?"

In a recent publication in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, or PNAS, Hellberg and his graduate student Carlos Prada investigate how corals specialize to particular environments in the ocean. Corals, animals that form coral reefs and some of the most diverse ecosystems in the world, start their lifecycle with a free floating larval stage. Coral larvae can disperse vast distances in open water. Different coral species share similar geographical locations, with different species often existing only yards apart. As Prada and Hellberg propose in their recent publication, the large dispersal potential of coral larvae in open water and the proximity of different species on the ocean floor creates a mystery for researchers who study speciation. Hellberg and Prada ask, "How can new marine species emerge without obvious geographic isolation?"

When it comes to corals within the relatively small confines of the Caribbean, which spans approximately 3 million square kilometers, the key to the puzzle appears to be habitat depth in the ocean. In others words, natural selection has led to the formation of different coral species according to how deep in the ocean these different corals grow.

Prada and Hellberg study candelabrum corals of the genus Eunicea, generally known as "sea fans," for which sister species have been shown to be segregated by ocean depth. One sister species survives better in shallow waters, while the other is better adapted to deep waters. These corals, like other corals, are very slow-growing animals. In fact, sea fan corals don't reach reproduction age until they are 15-30 years old, and can continue reproducing until they are 60 or more years old. So while candelabrum coral larvae can disperse large distances from their parents, landing and beginning to grow in either shallow or deep water habitats, small differences in survival rates at different depths between the two species and long generation times can combine to produce segregation.

"When these coral larvae first settle out after dispersal, they are all mixed up," Hellberg said. "But long larvae-to-reproduction times can compound small differences in survival at different depths. By the time these corals get to reproduction age, a lot has changed."

The shallow water sea fan coral even has a different morphology than its deep water sister. The shallow water coral fans out into a wide network of branches, while the deep water coral grows tall and spindly. According to Hellberg, these differences in morphology might well be genetic, with the different corals having different protein structures and levels of expression that are better adapted to their specific water depth environment. Hellberg hopes in future research to investigate the genetic basis of these different morphologies.

In other interesting results, Prada explained how transplanting the shallow coral species to deep water environments, and vice versa, can cause the coral to take on a morphology more like that of its sister species.

"Their morphologies are not super fixed," Prada said. "But they can't change all the way to a different morphology."

Prada observed that while shallow water sea fans can become taller and more spindly when transplanted in deep water environments, they don't seem to be able to make a complete transition to the morphology of the deep water sea fan. This suggests that the two corals, while they likely had a common ancestor, have adapted genetically and biochemically to their respective water depths.

Prada did ocean dives in the Bahamas, Panama, Puerto Rico and Cura?ao to sample candelabrum coral colonies. Back in the lab, he performed tests on the coral samples' genes to determine how shallow and deep corals become genetically different.

"Normally, organisms are differentiated by geography," Prada said. "But these corals are differentiated by depth."

Prada and Hellberg's research provides new insights into how new species form in the ocean, a topic of relatively limited research as opposed to speciation of terrestrial organisms.

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Original paper, visit http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/01/22/1208931110

Louisiana State University: http://www.lsu.edu

Thanks to Louisiana State University for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/126680/Professor_discovers_how_new_corals_species_form_in_the_ocean

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