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Transportation Science

Bird Navigation Based On Quantum Zeno Effect 96

Posted by kdawson from the schroedinger's-parrot dept.
KentuckyFC writes "How birds use the Earth's magnetic field to navigate has puzzled researchers for decades. In recent years, a growing body of evidence has pointed to the possibility that a weak magnetic field can influence the outcome of a certain type of chemical reaction involving the recombination of pairs of ions in bird retinas. The trouble is that the ion recombination is known to happen too quickly for the Earth's weak magnetic field to have any effect. Now it looks as if the quantum Zeno effect explains all, says one researcher (abstract). This is the watched-pot-never-boils effect in which the act of observing a quantum system maintains it for longer than expected. That's extraordinary news because it means a quantum sensor is determining the macroscopic behavior of living birds."
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Bird Navigation Based On Quantum Zeno Effect More

Bird Navigation Based On Quantum Zeno Effect

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  • Weird (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MBCook ( 132727 ) <foobarsoft@foobarsoft.com> on Friday April 18, 2008 @10:55AM (#23117406) Homepage

    So, from reading the article, the birds observing the chemical reaction, thus slowing it down long enough for the magnetic field of the Earth to have a detectable effect when it shouldn't.

    Quantum mechanics is so weird. Neat!

    But when the researchers looked for this, shouldn't that looking have caused the metaphorical pot to be watched thus inducing the effect, or had no one tried to measure this simply because they knew the reaction didn't take long enough (or shouldn't, ignoring quantum mechanics)?

    Bonus questions: The article said that had proved this by using a strong electric field to alter the way this reaction goes. Would it be possible to inject something into the birds that would prevent them from "watching" this reaction, so it would go at it's "normal" speed?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by TheRealMindChild ( 743925 )
      Actually this reminds me of those Old machines [btopenworld.com] that old astronomers used to try to explain how the heavens worked. Before we knew that we weren't the center of the universe... before the understanding of retrograde motion, they just kept adding gears to these things to make it work closer and closer to what they saw. They thought the answer to everything was "It must be more complex than what we understand". If I have learned anything in my life worth knowing is that the universe than we want to give it cre

    • Re:Weird (Score:4, Insightful)

      by aleph42 ( 1082389 ) * on Friday April 18, 2008 @12:02PM (#23118552)

      But when the researchers looked for this, shouldn't that looking have caused the metaphorical pot to be watched thus inducing the effect, or had no one tried to measure this simply because they knew the reaction didn't take long enough (or shouldn't, ignoring quantum mechanics)?

      I didn't have any serious courses on quantum-anything, but I think you are taking this way to
      "philosophically". "Observation" here actually just means interaction with a nearby atom.

      I think that the idea is that the atom is in an "undefined" state (or rather, multiple states at once), and that having an interaction (which should depend on the state) forces it to chose between states. Once this happens (in the bird's retina), I don't think any further interaction can affect anything, and certainly not something as indirect as a human looking at the bird.
      Confusion arise because of the words "observation", "retina" and looking" in the same topic.

      That said, I had the impression that those kind of quantum weirdness (like the living-dead cat) were a good hint that those thing can never scale up to act uppon the "regular" world, were everything is a result of statistics (like air pressure which is the statistical sum of random movement). A good exemple is how intricated atoms could theorically convert information at faster than light speed, but if you actually want to use it then the observation equipement needed will keep you under light speed (and it's not something you can get around). So if this turns out to be true, I will be quite amased.

      Bonus questions: The article said that had proved this by using a strong electric field to alter the way this reaction goes. Would it be possible to inject something into the birds that would prevent them from "watching" this reaction, so it would go at it's "normal" speed?

      Good idea! Let's stick the large electromagnet in the bird's retina, then watch to see if it's flying paterns are different! ;)
      • > "Observation" here actually just means interaction with a nearby atom.

        That's not enough to qualify as an observation in this context. What you need is some kind of coupling to the environment. That could be a chain reaction starting with an interaction with a nearby atom and ending up with a macroscopic change. But a nearby atom not coupled to anything else wouldn't do.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by tenco ( 773732 )
        Statistics in classical mechanics and in quantuum mechanics is not the same. If you have a system of particles, classical you assume that, in principle, you could measure every particles location and speed at a given time which determines the complete state of your system in the future (and which you could compute then, accuracy only limited by the accuracy of your measurement and computing equipment). So, classical, you assume that you have to use statistics because you don't have the right equipment to ca

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
      Aleph42 covered the basics. Read the linked (in the summary) article on Wikipedia about the quantum Zeno effect.

      "Observation" means interaction. If you take one of these molecules and bombard it with photos, atoms, whatever, it will take longer to switch states. The article seems to imply that it's interaction with the magnetic field itself that is slowing down the reaction.
    • I have a theory based on this [wikipedia.org] there was no actual process to anything until we startes looking for the process. Reading things like this article seem to confirm my thoughts.

  • I have a question... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Tenebrousedge ( 1226584 ) <`moc.liamg' `ta' `egdesuorbenet'> on Friday April 18, 2008 @10:57AM (#23117444)
    Is this a first? Are there any other known instances of quantum mechanics influencing the macroscopic behavior of anything else? Butterflies, for example? And what happens when the poles shift? [wikipedia.org]

    • Re:I have a question... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by zappepcs ( 820751 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:05AM (#23117538) Journal
      A damned good question. Could changing magnetic fields of the Earth and the Sun be the cause of the bee syndrome that is killing some 30% of all commercial bees in North America?

      Bees, like birds, just don't seem to get lost very often... until now. There seems to be no practical explanation of why the bees are disappearing. This might do it. Given that bees are smaller, perhaps the effects are greater on bees? Did the article give any clue as to how the volume of chemical might affect the interactions?

      Quite interesting. Given the story of evolution, and knowing that many animals use electromagnetic and quantum type navigation, how likely is it that humans have some similar capabilities?

      Not to get too whacked, but does any of this go anywhere toward explaining ghosts etc?

      All good stuff

      • Re:I have a question... (Score:5, Informative)

        by peragrin ( 659227 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:09AM (#23117614)
        Actually the bee problem is mostly identified with pollution. Air born pollution is limiting the range that pollen and other floral scents travel in the air thus limiting the mobility of bees.

        • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Actually the bee problem is mostly identified with a virus.

          "finding IAPV in a bee sample correctly distinguished CCD from non-CCD status 96.1 percent of the time."

          http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070906140803.htm [sciencedaily.com]

        • Re:I have a question... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Hadlock ( 143607 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:34AM (#23118098) Homepage Journal
          ... So says a 4 day old slashdot article. Next week we're going to have an article on how the sinking of the titanic influenced thermal currents in the atlantic, reducing El Nino's effect in the pacific, thus causing plants to flower before bees have come completely out of hibernation, leading to starvation.
           
          Clearly, since this is the most recent theory, all previous theories are deeply flawed.

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by fitten ( 521191 )
            It's Global Warming, er... Extreme Environmental Change (or whatever it is being called now)... everything else seems to be blamed on it, I don't see why this can't be blamed on it as well.

            • Re: (Score:1)

              by Hadlock ( 143607 )
              Well you know that global warming is caused by spent nuclear power waste seeping into the ground water, don't you? All aspects of modern living are eeeeeevil and will haunt us to the end of our days.

          • Clearly, since this is the most recent theory, all previous theories are deeply flawed.
            Please provide an address where I can send the grant money. Thanks!
          • The wording "mostly identified with" hardly implies that all previous explanations are "deeply flawed".

            Clearly, since the article in question is only 4 days old your parent poster can't have formed a well reasoned opinion on the matter.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Hadlock ( 143607 )
              Congratulations on adding absolutely nothing to the conversation! Including all of your previously searchable posts. Jesus. Go kill yourself now.

              Idea: Instead of telling people why they're wrong and leaving it at that, continue on with what you think should be done instead, and what brought you to that conclusion. You'll note you have zero replies to the comments you made - that's because they're not worth reading. Rather than being a jackass to everyone, you might consider constructive critisism. R

      • Not to get too whacked, but does any of this go anywhere toward explaining ghosts etc?
        Sorry, I think you just got a little too whacked.

    • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      ...well they are thinking that plants use a type of Quantum gate for Photosynthesis:
      http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/PBD-quantum-secrets.html ...

      It that counts as quantum mechanics influencing macroscopic behavior.

    • Re:I have a question... (Score:5, Funny)

      by johannesg ( 664142 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:30AM (#23118028)
      The lifecycle of cats is also determined by quantum mechanics.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Monkey ( 795756 )
      If this occurs in the retina a pole shift might not have any major effect on bird behavior. Eyes process what the landscape looks like, the possession of the sun, landmarks, and so on. Because the ability to sense 'north' occurs in the eyes, logically, the bird would take into account all information it's eyes gathered. This would provide redundancy and increased accuracy, along with making a pole shift an issue of recalibration, and not relearning entire thought processes.

    • Yes. Chlorophyll (Score:3, Insightful)

      by oni ( 41625 )
      Chlorophyll works by means of Resonance Energy Transfer [wikipedia.org] and that's also a quantum effect - though admittedly, not as cool as the bird navigation thing.

      I'd be willing to bet that this didn't evolve in birds. A lot of animals perform long distance migrations. In fact, I bet that this sense is found in most animals. We apes are probably the exception. We probably lost it while swinging from trees. But the genes are probably still there. So, one day you might be able to turn this on in your children.

      • Re:Yes. Chlorophyll (Score:5, Insightful)

        by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) ( 613870 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @04:51PM (#23122538) Journal
        Quantum effect this, quantum effect that. The fact that your head doesn't fall off is a quantum effect, without which electrons, protons and neutrons couldn't possibly form stable structures. Everything on a small enough scale is a "quantum effect". Saying that chlorophyll works by means of a quantum effect is like saying that computers rely on a one-is-bigger-than-zero effect.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by tuxgeek ( 872962 )
      Maybe we're over anal-izing the question. From my own observations as sort of an amateur hobbyist zoologist/ornithologist, birds have brains and memory retention, ie, they posses the ability to learn. Perhaps it's just a matter of older birds remember the way to go and the rest follow and learn the landmarks, to someday become the leader of the migration as well.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by clubby ( 1144121 )

        anal-izing

        I hope -- oh, God, how I hope -- you mean "analyzing." If I'm wrong, please do not correct me. I don't want to know. :P

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by tuxgeek ( 872962 )

          I hope -- oh, God, how I hope -- you mean "analyzing." If I'm wrong, please do not correct me. I don't want to know. :P
          Not too many catch the dry humor there. Glad you did. d:-/

          anal-ize - slang for reference to an anal retentive person, like my ex-wife ...

          I put the hyphen in there for clarity ...

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by DavidTC ( 10147 )

      Quantum mechanics influences the behavior of people carrying geiger counters.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
      Apparently the effect is sensitive to only a narrow window of magnetic field strengths, so if something significantly affects the field then the birds get lost. We've had birds through several reversals which argues that birds won't go extinct when it happens again.
    • Slashdot had a story about how plants seem to be using quantum physics in photosynthesis- specifically, the electron transport chain is so efficient because of quantum effects. Pretty cool, and if true all oxygen-requiring life on the planet is down to quantum mechanics.

  • No need for a quantum sensor... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by GrosTuba ( 227941 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @10:59AM (#23117474)
    Dude, we know how birds navigate: they follow roads [telegraph.co.uk].

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MBCook ( 132727 )

      That's an interesting article, I hadn't seen that.

      Of course, the article says that's what they do when they know the area. They just use the landscape to guide them. When unfamiliar with an area, it says they use the sun, starts, and magnetic field of the Earth to find out which way to go.

    • Re:No need for a quantum sensor... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SpeedBump0619 ( 324581 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:50AM (#23118380)
      What color are most roads? What do dark colors do in sunlight? What happens when air heats up? What's the easiest way for a bird to stay aloft?

      Lets all say it together...correllation != causality.

      • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Periwinkle. Fade, unless you wash with Tide. God kills a kitten. By weighing the same as a duck (or wood, or a witch).

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
        Mmmm, roads. You'd be surprised what happens to traffic patterns when you fly your hang glider along the highway.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Just Some Guy ( 3352 )

        Thus explaining why birds weren't practical until the early 1900s.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by CODiNE ( 27417 )
      From your article :

      "For long-distance navigation and for birds doing a journey for the first time, they will use their inbuilt compasses and take sun and star bearings.

      advertisement

      "But once homing pigeons have flown a journey more than once, they home in on a habitual route home, much as we do when we are driving or walking home from work.

      "In short, it looks like it is mentally easier for a bird to fly down a road and then turn right. They are just making their journey as simple as possible".

      Good way to mi

  • Cool! (Score:3, Funny)

    by thecountryofmike ( 744040 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:03AM (#23117520)
    Schrodinger's Pigeon?!?!
  • What ? Frickin' birds with frickin' quantum zeno effects attached to their heads ??
    Only seen on Slashdot...
  • Birds killed by non-dead, non-live cat...
  • And cue the ID folks claiming irreducible complexity [wikipedia.org] in

    3...

    2...

    1...

  • New class of electronic devices. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:36AM (#23118142) Homepage

    Wow. I want to see the full paper.

    If this is for real, there's a whole new class of electronic devices waiting to be developed. The Zeno effect has been observed experimentally, but only down near absolute zero. If it can be observed at room temperature, it could be useful.

    • RAIB? (Redundant Array of Independent Birds?) A quad-core 3ghz pigeon?

      My electric bill will be down to nothing, but the birdseed bill will be killing me.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Rakarra ( 112805 )


      If this is for real, there's a whole new class of electronic devices waiting to be developed.
      The Zeno effect has been observed experimentally, but only down near absolute zero. If it can be observed at room temperature, it could be useful.

      No, no, clearly this proves that birds brains actually function normally close to absolute zero. The trick is to figure out how they're doing it.

    • Too late. (Score:2)

      by jd ( 1658 )
      A swallow has already patented the technology, along with quantum lifting gear for coconuts.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
      You could say that you are constantly observing the Zeno effect. The constant interaction of pretty much every macroscopic object suppresses quantum weirdness. The cat can't be both dead and alive because it is constantly being "observed" by bouncing air molecules, photons and whatnot off it.
    • Paper [arxiv.org]. You'll need to wear suitable shades to protect you from the awfulness of the font in which it is written.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )
      If this is for real, there's a whole new class of electronic devices waiting to be developed.

      Oh great, iPods that drip white gunk on your windshield.
         
  • My personal email suffers from this - Everytime the boss walks past
  • I think Bob's beer [angryflower.com] may be somewhat tenuously relarted to this. There is the "quantum beer effect" whare if it is known that there is beer in the fridge, the beer will for some strange reason disappear. Especially if Tami or Amy are around.

    -mcgrew
  • "Kominis is careful not to mention it but the quantum consciousness people are going to be all over this like freshmen at a sorority party."

    Interestingly enough, the Wikipedia article mentions exactly. Personally, I think the Quantum Consciousness idea is hogwash, but that's just because I don't think that that is necessary to explain consciousness. Neural networks are weird creatures, and I'm pretty sure that a good chunk of cognitive ability (including self-identification) can come from that alone.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
      If you want to believe you have free will then you have no choice but to invoke quantum mechanics.

    • Neural networks are weird creatures

      Creatures are weird neural networks, too.

  • Every chemical sensor is a "quantum sensor" (Score:3, Insightful)

    by GroeFaZ ( 850443 ) on Friday April 18, 2008 @11:59AM (#23118512)
    because every seonsor has to obey the rules of quantum mechanics. The only difference being which theory is sufficient to explain a certain effect.

    Even if pointing this out may be a bit boring, people should stop mystifiying Science and speak of it as cavemen would grunt of a lightning storm. There's absolutely nothing mysterious about Science, that's the whole point of Science to begin with.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )
      Most sensors don't directly make use of specifically quantum effects. They can be described purely in classical terms.

      It's like saying that my car is a relativistic vehicle. Sure, it obeys the theories of relativity, but Newton is more than enough to describe it.

      Or describing my notebook as a quantum computer.

      When people (even non-physicists) talk about quantum mechanical effects, its accepted that they're talking about UNIQUELY quantum mechanical effects. If you see some sort of mysticism in that then t

    • Re: (Score:1, Redundant)

      by jd ( 1658 )
      You're totally correct there. However, you should remember that departments get funded by how often their papers get cited, so there is an incentive to make all papers fully buzzword-compliant rather than scientifically correct. In this particular case, it could be argued that the buzzword is appropriate because the effect being utilized is normally only seen at the microscopic level, not the macroscopic as here. However, precisely since the Zeno Effect is normally only seen at the microscopic level, the ad
  • That's extraordinary news because it means a quantum sensor is determining the macroscopic behavior of living birds."

    I don't see the novelty. Quantum effects are what determine the behavior, the existence and everything else about the living birds, the dead mammals, the burning stars and whatever else you can imagine.

    • But you can describe an awful lot of phenomena using entirely classical (ie non-quantum) physics. Behaviors that can only be explained through quantum mechanics are interesting, and we rarely see them having effects on the macroscopic world except in carefully designed experiments.

  • What do birds see? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Remus Shepherd ( 32833 ) <remus@panix.com> on Friday April 18, 2008 @01:37PM (#23120036) Homepage
    I'm intrigued that this effect happens in avian retinas. Do birds actually *see* magnetic north and south? As in, everything to the north is tinted one color, and everything to the south is tinted another hue?

    Fascinating. Birds (and possibly dinosaurs) see the world as one gigantic rave. Sometimes I feel I'm missing too much by being born human.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      Do birds actually *see* magnetic north and south? As in, everything to the north is tinted one color, and everything to the south is tinted another hue? Fascinating. Birds (and possibly dinosaurs) see the world as one gigantic rave. Sometimes I feel I'm missing too much by being born human.

      Worse yet, birds have 4 types of color cones in their eyes, and we only have 3. They can see colors we can't. Most sun-dwelling vertebrates can see more colors. The theory is that mammals lost some color ability because

  • After reading all the comments, I realized striking similarity of the style of wild assumptions of those comments to "theories" about "Lost"
  • So this article simultaneously is and is not a Monty Python reference?
  • The Zeno Effect must differ from the Xemu [wikipedia.org] effect in that with the latter, the more you observe the event, the more full of crap it is.
  • Makes one wonder if its possible that the human brain takes advantage of some kinds of quantum-level effects. This could mean that our existing neural net model is insufficient, and that the brain is even more complex than we realized. If its possible to take advantage of such forces, then evolution likely would.
  • It seems kind of odd that birds would be the first, and perhaps only, animal this affect has been found in nature. But then one realizes that birds face strong evolutionary pressure to weigh as least as possible. Thus, whereas standard chemistry may be sufficient in a land animal, the mechanism may weigh too much for birds, resulting in evolution finding a more complex and indirect, but lighter solution. Of course, this is just speculation at this point.

  • I had previously been under the impression that the structures in biological cells were too large to utilise quantum effects, but this seems to contradict that.

    This might merit another look at Roger Penrose's theory that conciousness has a quantum origin, as the main objection to it previously was that there could not be quantum biological effects.

  • Birds use the quantum zeno effect to navigate? Is that so? And there I was thinking it was because they had iron oxide crystals embedded in their beaks [springerlink.com], oh how silly that all sounds now :)

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