Control of a 2-Level System to Reduce Colored Noise
The main part of my MSc degree in Physics (quantum information) was the thesis. Its abstract can be found here and the complete work can be downloaded: Michael_Shalyt_Control of a 2-Level System to Reduce Colored Noise.
This research was the seed for a wider approach – published in the New Journal of Physics: https://iopscience.iop.org/1367-2630/17/4/043009/. The article is freely available here. This particular journal encourages authors to create a video abstract of their work:
Photon-energy qubit generation by spontaneous emission in a V-type system
During my final year as an undergraduate (studying Electrical Engineering and Physics at the Technion) I collaborated with 2 PhD students (in Prof. Meir Orenstein’s group, EE faculty) on a research project in quantum optics. The results were published in the Journal of Physics B (link). The full article: Photon-energy qubit generation by spontaneous emission in a V-type system.
In the pursuit of the quantum computation dream, scientists suggested various methods of implementing qubits (the bits of quantum computers). To this day there is no clear winner - each mechanism has its pros and cons. We focused on energy-superposition qubits (think of the qubit as a photon being both “red” and “blue” simultaneously – how much is it “red” vs. how much “blue” is what encodes the information). The research dealt with the initialization problem - how to create energy qubits in arbitrary starting states with speed and precision.
Physics Olympiad
After a rather grueling learning and training procedure throughout my final year in high school, I passed all the qualification exams and participated in the 36th IPHO (International Physics Olympiad) as part of the national team (and scored highest among Israelis).
The whole process had a great influence on me. Beyond the knowledge and skills - it taught me that with a lot of hard work I could achieve more than I previously considered possible. This influence, as well as the great people in the Olympiad community, convinced me to become a guide myself. I’ve been coaching the next generations of IPHO participants ever since, including at the 12th Asian Physics Olympiad (2011) and the 50th IPHO (2019).
One of the ideas we had for improving the level of physics education in schools is a series of short lectures explaining fundamental physics principles in alternative ways. This is the pilot, talking about Galeleo’s gravity model:
The time traveler’s loneliness
I love explaining complex ideas in simple terms, so I took a course during my fourth year at the Technion called “Science in the Media” - teaching methods to make scientific topics accessible without losing the core concepts. One of the projects assigned to us was to write a popular-science piece based on an interview – for a hypothetical newspaper. Mine was selected to be published in an actual newspaper (see article) and a popular science website.
The article is about the investigation of closed time-loops (more commonly known as “time-machines”…) under the theoretical restrictions of General Relativity, based on an interview with Dr. Dana Levanony – then a PhD student studying the subject.