We're proud to announce one of our latest ventures: a research program investigating the theme of "Information as Fuel." We intend to award up to US$8million in this program, which has been sponsored by the Templeton World Charity Foundation. We are currently accepting initial applications for experimental projects on the topic, until March 31, 2019.
What do we mean by "information as fuel"? Since at least the nineteenth century, when people sought to understand how steam engines work and what limits their efficiency, it has been known that there is an intimate link between information and thermodynamics. Analysis of the physical limits of information acquisition and erasure has established a fundamental connection between information and the second law of thermodynamics. Inverting this relationship leads to the intriguing possibility that (ordered) information may serve as a resource--in effect, a type of fuel.
Expressed in the starkest terms, cutting-edge theoretical work implies that one could run an engine using information either as the fuel or as the way to dump entropy to satisfy the second law. Other conjectures have been accompanied by thought experiments that try to elucidate the implications of newly developed concepts.聽But while significant theoretical progress is being made, experimental study of the non-equilibrium thermodynamics of information generally has tended to trail some distance behind.
Fortunately, advances in experimental techniques are putting practical experiments with such systems within reach. Quantum information can be created and manipulated in a variety of implementations, ranging from trapped ions to solid state superconducting circuits to spin states of electrons. There is thus rich scope for applying concepts of quantum thermodynamics to quantum systems out of equilibrium.
With this in mind, FQXi has chosen to focus entirely on experiments in the Information as Fuel grant round. We intend to fund 4-8 research groups globally with three-year grants ranging from $500,000 to $2,500,000 per research group. Each group will design, perform, and report on one or more experiments, in which the group will incorporate a significant theoretical effort as part of the experiment's motivation, design, and interpretation.
Both our large-grant and mini-grant programs are designed to particularly encourage new collaborations between experimentalists and theoreticians. The Information as Fuel theme will also be featured at a future FQXi international conference, and through essay contests. FQXi has always been committed to fostering a vibrant research community, and we envision that the Information as Fuel program will continue in this tradition.