Quantum Entanglement and Photosynthesis

medcalf writes "Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and UC Berkeley have experimentally shown that plants use quantum entanglement in photosynthesis. Researcher Mohan Sarovar said, 'The lessons we’re learning about the quantum aspects of light harvesting in natural systems can be applied to the design of artificial photosynthetic systems that are even better. The organic structures in light harvesting complexes and their synthetic mimics could also serve as useful components of quantum computers or other quantum-enhanced devices, such as wires for the transfer of information.' According to the article, 'What may prove to be this study's most significant revelation is that contrary to the popular scientific notion that entanglement is a fragile and exotic property, difficult to engineer and maintain, the Berkeley researchers have demonstrated that entanglement can exist and persist in the chaotic chemical complexity of a biological system.'"

Comments

Biodiversity Is Priceless

[Doc Ruby]

This research shows a broader point we should learn: every species that we extinct takes with it to oblivion some mechanisms for coping with the world that we could use ourselves. Not enough coping mechanisms to keep it fit to survive in the world we've made, but many mechanisms that go down with it.

Of course many species go extinct independent of human action (though with human action so pervasive, what species is entirely untouched by it?), but there's little we can do about them. The ones we make extinct through carelessness, wrong priorities and other waste are lost to us in our efforts to remain fit ourselves in the environment we're making.

Re:Biodiversity Is Priceless

[gregor-e]

99.999% of all species that ever existed are now extinct. Do you believe that 99.999% of all useful coping mechanisms are gone? And what does any of this have to do with the finding of quantum entanglement in photosynthetic systems?

Re:Biodiversity Is Priceless

[Hal_Porter]

If Shrodinger's cat were the last cat then cats would be in a superposed state of extinct and not extinct so long as no additional biodiversity research was done.

I think he's trying to say we shouldn't do the research, but maybe I've misunderstood.

Re:Biodiversity Is Priceless

[Hal_Porter]

Humans haven't yet made as big a mess as photosynthetic plants did 2.4 billion years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event

Re:Biodiversity Is Priceless

[Alef]

I guess if you were living your entire life inside the Library of Alexandria, you would be burning books for fuel. Especially the "useless" ones written in a foreign language that you don't understand.

I think humans are blinded by the extraordinary diversity around us to the degree that we fail to realize how unique it is. And our life spans are too short for us to grasp what we are doing. We destroy things that have taken hundreds of millions of years to form in a generation without even reflecting on it. From a geological perspective, we are likely at par with some of the large impact events.

Re:Biodiversity Is Priceless

[jelizondo]

Please, please. I hate to see people one would suppose have a better understanding of mathematics that the average Joe Sixpack make stupid statements.

Saying X percentage of species have died because of human action assumes that we know how many total species there were at a given point in time, which is false. Even today we don’t know. Very frequently new species are found and some thought extinct are rediscovered.

What do we know of the big extinction events? Only what we can find on the fossil record. Given the constant churning of the Earth’s surface, that most of the crust is under water, that most of the crust is not conducive to fossilizing plant or animal remains, we can’t even begin to know how many species there were or how many went extinct.

Yeah, we may guess. But that’s all it is: a guess. Remember how many stars we thought there were one hundred years ago? Well, there you go, off by several orders of magnitude.

And here's the link

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.physorg.com/news184423418.html

Yet another nail in the coffin of vegetarianism

[Draek]

Do cows use quantum entanglement? no. Do sheep? no. Plants do. Why would I eat the *smarter* lifeform?

In fact, I'd celebrate with a burger if it weren't for the fact that lettuces are a plant. Anybody know of a meat-based replacement for a plant-friendly person such as myself?

Re:Yet another nail in the coffin of vegetarianism

[Bigjeff5]

Anybody know of a meat-based replacement for a plant-friendly person such as myself?

Just follow the meatitarian's motto: When in doubt, add bacon.

The tricky bit here is the bread. That's plant based. Perhaps you could use large cut deep-fried pork or beef skin as a suitable substitute?

If you want to get philosophical, though, you run into a much bigger problem: All meat comes from dead plants first. Cow's are built on massive quantities of grass, pigs are built on oats and anything else edible (which all come from plants at some point). It's a losing proposition.

Your only real option is to live on honey and honeybees. Plants offer the bees nectar in exchange for assisting their reproduction, so no plant is ever harmed in the production of honey. Since bees are fed on honey, they are fair game too. There are some birds that have this type of symbiotic relationship with plants, which would make them ok to eat, but you can't farm raise them because they must be a part of the cycle to make them plant friendly!

You could also live on maggots and flies, which only consume meat (and indirectly plants) after that meat has died from natural processes. Honey, maggots, maybe a hummingbird every once in a while, supplemented with a lot of fungus - yeah, I think you could really make a go of it!

Re:Yet another nail in the coffin of vegetarianism

[maxwell demon]

Actually you can also eat fruits: While the fruits are from plants, they are explicitly produced by the plants to be eaten (because that way they spread). Just don't eat or destroy the seed. Throw them on earth, so they have a chance to grow.

I'm a meat-eater, but. . .

[Fantastic Lad]

Animals have brains, right?

If quantum entanglement doesn't turn out to be a vital component in neurological science, then I'll be a fish on a loaf.

-FL

Hameroff/Penrose model of quantum consciousness

[Dr_Banzai]

This finding seems to give support to the Orch-OR (orchestrated objective reduction) theory of quantum consciousness proposed by Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose. One of the main objections to the theory is that quantum coherence could not be sustained in the warm biological environment for sufficient duration. If quantum entaglement is a normal feature of photosynthesis, it's less of a stretch to believe that quantum coherence could be one of the mechanisms to give rise to consciousness in higher lifeforms.

Re:No details but interesting

[jmizrahi]

The difficulty in achieving entanglement comes from the system being perturbed at random from thermal vibrations.

That's not quite accurate. The difficulty in achieving entanglement comes from the inherent difficulty in isolating a quantum system from its environment. In the case of ion trap quantum computing, for example, this isolation is achieved through an ultra high vacuum. Ultra high vacuum has its own difficulties, but does not require cryogenics.

Actually, grass grows very fast

[Chicken_Kickers]

Specifically, bamboo http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo which can grow 60cm in a day. The summary seems to imply that biological systems are simple compared to high tech artificial systems. I might be biased because I am a microbiologist, but nothing humans have ever constructed have even remotely approached the complexity and efficiency of biological systems. For example, have a look at the bacterial outboard motor (flagellum) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagellum. Just look at it. Isn't it beautiful, complex yet efficient at what it does. Considering that at bacterial scale, the liquid medium surrounding it is like molasses, makes it more incredible.

The ubiquity of lab phenomena

[Lorien_the_first_one]

What happens in the lab is a very special situation that allows us to observe naturally occuring phenomena. What rarely is mentioned in the articles about particle physics discoveries, quantum entangled photosynthesis being the exception, is that the phenomena that has been discovered is happening all over the place, all the time. The lab allows us to see what has already been going on for a long time. A great example is the discovery of the neutrino. Giant pools of water buried deep in a mountain laced with scintillators, allow us to detect the neutrinos. Yet, neutrinos are passing straight through us and the earth all the time from the fusion process in the sun.

I think that this discovery is the first in a long series to show that quantum entanglement has common uses by life, and that life can use it to its advantage.