Jonathan Oppenheim

Oppenheim obtained a bachelor's degree at the University of Toronto in 1993 and PhD at the University of British Columbia in 2001. His PhD thesis titled Quantum Time, focused on time ordering in quantum mechanics and was supervised by Bill Unruh.

In 2004, he was a postdoctoral researcher under Jacob Bekenstein and a Royal Society University Fellow at the University of Cambridge before moving to University College London.

In 2005, together with Michał Horodecki and Andreas Winter, Oppenheim discovered quantum state-merging and used this primitive to show that quantum information could be negative.{{Cite journal |last=Horodecki |first=Michał |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |last3=Winter |first3=Andreas |date=2005 |title=Partial quantum information |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/nature03909 |journal=Nature |language=en |volume=436 |issue=7051 |pages=673–676 |doi=10.1038/nature03909 |issn=1476-4687|arxiv=quant-ph/0505062 }} Following on this work, Oppenheim and collaborators have developed a resource theory for thermodynamics on the nano and quantum scale.{{Cite journal |last=Horodecki |first=Michał |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |date=2013-06-26 |title=Fundamental limitations for quantum and nanoscale thermodynamics |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms3059 |journal=Nature Communications |language=en |volume=4 |issue=1 |doi=10.1038/ncomms3059 |issn=2041-1723|arxiv=1111.3834 }}{{Cite journal |last1=Brandão |first1=Fernando |last2=Horodecki |first2=Michał |last3=Ng |first3=Nelly |last4=Oppenheim |first4=Jonathan |last5=Wehner |first5=Stephanie |date=2015-03-17 |title=The second laws of quantum thermodynamics |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |language=en |volume=112 |issue=11 |pages=3275–3279 |arxiv=1305.5278 |bibcode=2015PNAS..112.3275B |doi=10.1073/pnas.1411728112 |issn=0027-8424 |pmc=4372001 |pmid=25675476 |doi-access=free}}

In 2017, Oppenheim and Lluis Masanes derived the third law of thermodynamics using quantum information arguments and set a bound to the speed at which information can be erased.{{Cite web |last=Crane |first=Leah |date=14 March 2017 |title=Cooling to absolute zero mathematically outlawed after a century |url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/2124597-cooling-to-absolute-zero-mathematically-outlawed-after-a-century/ |access-date=4 April 2024 |website=New Scientist |language=en-US}}{{cite journal|title=A general derivation and quantification of the third law of thermodynamics|date=2017 |doi=10.1038/ncomms14538 |last1=Masanes |first1=Lluís |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |journal=Nature Communications |volume=8 |page=14538 |pmid=28290452 |pmc=5355879 |arxiv=1412.3828 |bibcode=2017NatCo...814538M }}

Oppenheim published a proposal in 2023 for a hybrid theory that couples classical general relativity with quantum field theory. According to this proposal, spacetime is not quantized but smooth and continuous, and is subject to random fluctuations.{{cite journal |author=Jonathan Oppenheim |date=2023 |title=A Postquantum Theory of Classical Gravity? |url=https://journals.aps.org/prx/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevX.13.041040 |journal=Physical Review X |volume=13 |issue=4 |page=041040 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevX.13.041040 |access-date=2024-04-03|arxiv=1811.03116 }}{{cite journal |author=Hannah Devlin |url=https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/dec/04/wobbly-spacetime-may-resolve-contradictory-physics-theories |title='Wobbly spacetime' may help resolve contradictory physics theories |journal=The Guardian |date=2023-12-04 |access-date=2023-12-17}}

As a student, Oppenheim was involved in the Edible Ballot Society which satirically advanced eating ballots to highlight the democracy gap in electoral politics.{{cite book |first=W. Wesley |last=Pue |title=Pepper in our Eyes: the APEC Affair |year=2000 |publisher=UBC Press |location=Vancouver, Canada |isbn=978-0-7748-0779-1 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/pepperinoureyesa0000unse }} He was arrested at the 1997 APEC protests on University of British Columbia campus.{{cite news |work=The Globe and Mail |first=Campbell |last= Clark |date=March 27, 2002 |title=APEC activists deserve an apology, RCMP told}} He withdrew from the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP following the refusal of the Prime Minister to testify.{{cite news |work=The Globe and Mail |first=Jane |last=Armstrong |date=March 1, 2000 |title=Protesters withdraw complaints from APEC summit inquiry}}{{cite web |url=http://www.ubcpress.ubc.ca/pepper/timeline.html |title=University of BC timeline}}

His group was responsible for smuggling a siege catapult{{cite web|last1=Mitchell|first1=Dave|title=Case Study: The Teddy Bear Catapult|url=http://beautifultrouble.org/case/the-teddy-bear-catapult/|website=Beautiful Trouble|access-date=13 May 2015}} into the medieval city of Quebec during the Summit of Americas, 2001. It was used to lob teddy bears.{{cite news |work=The Gazette (Montreal) |first=Allison |last=Hanes |date=May 1, 2001 |title=The great teddy-bear turn-in }}{{cite web |url=http://www.rabble.ca/news/we-made-catapult-judy-rebick-got |title=Group Claims Responsibility|date=10 October 2008 }}{{cite web |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8790416/Dale-Farm-quantum-physicist-helps-travellers-out-of-a-hole.html |title=Quantum physicist helps travellers out of a hole|date=26 September 2011 }}

• {{cite journal |last1=Oppenheim |first1=Jonathan |last2=Horodecki |first2=Michał |last3=Horodecki |first3=Paweł |last4=Horodecki |first4=Ryszard |title=Thermodynamical Approach to Quantifying Quantum Correlations |journal=Physical Review Letters |date=11 October 2002 |volume=89 |issue=18 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevLett.89.180402|arxiv=quant-ph/0112074 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Horodecki |first1=Michał |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |last3=Winter |first3=Andreas |title=Partial quantum information |journal=Nature |date=August 2005 |volume=436 |issue=7051 |pages=673–676 |doi=10.1038/nature03909|arxiv=quant-ph/0505062 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Oppenheim |first1=Jonathan |title=Implementing a Quantum Computation by Free Falling |journal=Science |date=24 February 2006 |volume=311 |issue=5764 |pages=1106–1107 |doi=10.1126/science.1124295 |url=https://www.ucl.ac.uk/oppenheim/articles/free-fall.pdf |access-date=18 March 2024}}
• {{cite journal |last1=Oppenheim |first1=Jonathan |last2=Wehner |first2=Stephanie |title=The Uncertainty Principle Determines the Nonlocality of Quantum Mechanics |journal=Science |date=19 November 2010 |volume=330 |issue=6007 |pages=1072–1074 |doi=10.1126/science.1192065|arxiv=1004.2507 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Horodecki |first1=Michał |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |title=Fundamental limitations for quantum and nanoscale thermodynamics |journal=Nature Communications |date=26 June 2013 |volume=4 |issue=1 |doi=10.1038/ncomms3059|arxiv=1111.3834 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Brandão |first1=Fernando G. S. L. |last2=Horodecki |first2=Michał |last3=Oppenheim |first3=Jonathan |last4=Renes |first4=Joseph M. |last5=Spekkens |first5=Robert W. |title=Resource Theory of Quantum States Out of Thermal Equilibrium |journal=Physical Review Letters |date=18 December 2013 |volume=111 |issue=25 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevLett.111.250404|arxiv=1111.3882 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Brandão |first1=Fernando |last2=Horodecki |first2=Michał |last3=Ng |first3=Nelly |last4=Oppenheim |first4=Jonathan |last5=Wehner |first5=Stephanie |title=The second laws of quantum thermodynamics |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |date=17 March 2015 |volume=112 |issue=11 |pages=3275–3279 |doi=10.1073/pnas.1411728112|arxiv=1305.5278 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Masanes |first1=Lluís |last2=Oppenheim |first2=Jonathan |title=A general derivation and quantification of the third law of thermodynamics |journal=Nature Communications |date=14 March 2017 |volume=8 |issue=1 |doi=10.1038/ncomms14538|arxiv=1412.3828 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Oppenheim |first1=Jonathan |title=A Postquantum Theory of Classical Gravity? |journal=Physical Review X |date=4 December 2023 |volume=13 |issue=4 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevX.13.041040|arxiv=1811.03116 }}

{{Reflist}}

{{Scholia}}

• [https://www.ucl.ac.uk/oppenheim/ Oppenheim's Homepage at UCL]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20120918202742/http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/jon Oppenheim's Homepage at University of Cambridge]
• [http://old.phys.huji.ac.il/~jono/ Oppenheim's Homepage at Hebrew University]
• {{cite web |last1=Grossman |first1=Lisa |title=Universe's Quantum Weirdness Limits Its Weirdness |url=https://www.wired.com/2010/11/entangled-uncertainty/ |website=Wired |access-date=18 March 2024}}
• {{cite web |title=The Physicist Who Bets That Gravity Can’t Be Quantized |url=https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-physicist-who-bets-that-gravity-cant-be-quantized-20230710/ |website=Quanta Magazine |access-date=18 March 2024 |language=en |date=10 July 2023}}

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Category:Living people

Category:Year of birth missing (living people)

Category:British quantum physicists

Category:University of British Columbia alumni

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