{"id":31372,"date":"2026-05-15T15:57:57","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T06:57:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/?p=31372"},"modified":"2026-07-13T15:58:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T06:58:26","slug":"using-atomic-clocks-to-reveal-the-quantum-properties-of-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/31372","title":{"rendered":"Using atomic clocks to reveal the quantum properties of time"},"content":{"rendered":"

Associate Professor Joshua Foo
\nInstitute for Advanced Study<\/span><\/strong>
\nFukuoka, Japan\u2014In our day-to-day lives, we recognize the movement of time as hands spinning around a clock or digits rolling on a phone. But the nature of time remains one of the deepest questions in physics. You\u2019ve probably heard how in Einstein\u2019s theory of relativity, time flows differently depending on speed and gravity.<\/p>\n

When quantum mechanics is involved, time gets trickier. At that level, a clock\u2019s motion can exist in \u201csuperposition,\u201d where the different flows of time all exist at the same moment. However, this interplay of time between relativity and quantum physics has never been observed experimentally.<\/p>\n

Publishing in Physical Review Letters, researchers from Kyushu University, in collaboration with the Stevens Institute of Technology, University of Waterloo, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Colorado State University, and Stockholm University, designed a theoretical framework showing that current state-of-the-art trapped-ion atomic clocks can be used to observe this \u201cquantum superposition of times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Atomic clocks are a type of super-precise clock that measure time by monitoring the frequency of certain atoms. Because of their precision, they are fundamental to modern technologies such as GPS. In fact, they have become so precise and sensitive that they can detect the time dilation predicted by Einstein\u2019s theory over a height difference of a few millimeters.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the precision that led us to develop our theoretical model. We found that the atomic clock’s motion becomes \u201centangled\u201d with its internal energy. The signature of this entanglement is that the clock itself loses some of its quantum properties, which can be detected using modern techniques,\u201d explains Associate Professor Joshua Foo of Kyushu University\u2019s Institute for Advanced Studies and one of the lead authors of the paper. \u201cWe introduced a new technique for controlling the atomic clock\u2019s motion, improving its sensitivity to this effect by 100 to 1000 times.\u201d<\/p>\n

The work establishes that atomic clocks can be used as a platform to explore the quantum nature of time, and opens a new experimental frontier in fundamental physics, as well as leading to more precise next-generation clocks.<\/p>\n

\u201cNaturally, bringing our theoretical model to reality is the big next step, and developing a detailed experiment that accounts for real-world unpredictability will give us further insight into our model,\u201d concludes Foo. \u201cWe are also interested in exploring whether atomic clocks could eventually be used to probe the quantum realm of gravity, the other fundamental question in physics.\u201d<\/p>\n

Research-related inquiries<\/h4>\n

Joshua Foo, Associate Professor<\/a>
\nInstitute for Advanced Studies<\/a>
\nContact information can also be found in the full release<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Associate Professor Joshua Foo Institute for Advanced Study Fukuoka, Japan\u2014In our day-to-day lives, we recognize the movement of time as hands spinning around a clock or digits rolling on a phone. But the nature of time remains one of the deepest questions in physics. You\u2019ve probably heard how in Einstein\u2019s theory of relativity, time flows […]","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[24,29],"tags":[43],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31372"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31372"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31372\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31423,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31372\/revisions\/31423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdgs.kyushu-u.ac.jp\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}