Shaped quantum light is turning ordinary photons into powerful tools for the future of technology.
A global group of scientists, including researchers from the UAB, has published a new review in Nature Photonics exploring a rapidly developing area of research called quantum structured light. This field is changing how information can be sent, measured, and processed by combining quantum physics with carefully designed patterns of light in space and time. By doing so, researchers can create photons capable of carrying far more information than traditional light.
From Qubits to Higher Dimensional Quantum States
The review explains that light can be controlled through several properties at once, including polarization, spatial modes, and frequency. By manipulating these different degrees of freedom, scientists can generate high-dimensional quantum states. In these systems, familiar qubits (two-dimensional, with photons in superposition of two quantum states) are replaced by qudits (with more than two dimensions). This shift greatly expands the range of possibilities for quantum technologies.
In quantum communication, these high-dimensional photons improve security because each photon can carry more information. They also make it possible to run many communication channels at the same time while improving resistance to errors and background noise. For quantum computing, structured light allows for simpler and faster circuit designs and makes it easier to create the complex quantum states needed for advanced simulations.
New Opportunities in Imaging and Measurement
Quantum structured light is also opening new paths in imaging and metrology. The authors point to major improvements in resolution techniques, including the recent development of the holographic quantum microscope, which allows obtaining images of delicate biological samples. The approach also supports the creation of extremely sensitive sensors that rely on quantum correlations.
Beyond imaging and sensing, structured light can be used to simulate complex quantum systems. These simulations can help researchers predict how molecules interact within networks, an ability that could support the discovery and design of new materials.
Rapid Progress Over Two Decades
Professor Andrew Forbes, corresponding author from the University of the Witwatersrand, at Johannesburg, says the field has evolved dramatically over the past twenty years. “The tailoring of quantum states, where quantum light is engineered for a particular purpose, has gathered pace of late, finally starting to show its full potential. Twenty years ago the toolkit for this was virtually empty. Today we have on-chip sources of quantum structured light that are compact and efficient, able to create and control quantum states.”
Despite this progress, challenges remain. “Although we have made amazing progress, there are still challenging issues,” says Forbes. “The distance reach with structured light, both classical and quantum, remains very low, but this is also an opportunity, stimulating the search for more abstract degrees of freedom to exploit.”
From Research Curiosity to Practical Impact
According to researcher Adam Vallés from the Optics Group of the UAB Department of Physics, the field has reached a critical moment. “We are at a turning point: quantum structured light is no longer just a scientific curiosity, but a tool with real potential to transform communication, computing and image processing.” Vallés also highlights UAB’s leading role in this area through its collaboration with Forbes, pointing to “advances of great international impact, such as the stimulated teleportation of quantum information encoded in high dimensions, the design of laser cavities to generate complex states of high purity and, in the field of cryptography, the distribution of robust quantum keys in the face of obstacles that block communication channels.”
Reference: “Progress in quantum structured light” by Andrew Forbes, Fazilah Nothlawala and Adam Vallés, 21 November 2025, Nature Photonics.
DOI: 10.1038/s41566-025-01795-x
The review, which appears as the cover article in this month’s issue of Nature Photonics, reflects a long-running collaboration between Vallés and the structured light research group led by Forbes at the Faculty of Physics of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. The work was also supported by the Catalonia Quantum Academy (CQA), a collaborative initiative coordinated by the Institut de Ciències Fotòniques (ICFO) and promoted by the Government of Catalonia. The academy focuses on strengthening education and talent development in quantum sciences and technologies across Catalonia.
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8 Comments
Every “new” so called “quantum” property listed in the above article is as well , in fact better, explained as a property of light by the centuries old classical wave only model( ie, Thomas Young). Polarisation, frequency OAM, and SAM are all CLASSICAL wave properties. One doesn’t need imaginary photons.
VERY GOOD!
There are even more ridiculous facts and glorious achievements than what you said. For example，two sets of cobalt-60 are manually rotated in opposite directions, and even without detection, people around the world know that they will not be symmetrical because these two objects are not mirror images of each other at all. However, a group of so-called physicists and so-called academic publications do not believe it. They conducted experiments and the results were indeed asymmetric, but they still firmly believed that these two objects were mirror images of each other, and the asymmetry was due to a violation of the previous natural laws (CP violation). In the history of science, there can never be a dirtier and uglier operation and explanation than this. These people and the so-called academic publications they manipulate no longer know what shame is.
When we pursue the ultimate truth of all things, the space in which our bodies and all things exist may itself be the final and deepest puzzle we need to explore. This is not only the pursuit of physics, but also the most magnificent exploration of the origin of the universe by human reason.
In today’s physics, some so-called peer-reviewed journals—including Physical Review Letters, Nature, Science, and others—stubbornly insist on and promote the following:
1. Even though θ and τ particles exhibit differences in experiments, physics can claim they are the same particle. This is science.
2. Even though topological vortices and antivortices have identical structures and opposite rotational directions, physics can define their structures and directions as entirely different. This is science.
3. Even though two sets of cobalt-60 rotate in opposite directions and experiments reveal asymmetry, physics can still define them as mirror images of each other. This is science.
4. Even though vortex structures are ubiquitous—from cosmic accretion disks to particle spins—physics must insist that vortex structures do not exist and require verification. Only the particles that like God, Demonic, or Angelic are the most fundamental structures of the universe. This is science.
5. Even though everything occupies space and maintains its existence in time, physics must still debate and insist on whether space exists and whether time is a figment of the human mind. This is science.
6. Even though space, with its non-stick, incompressible, and isotropic characteristics, provides a solid foundation for the development of physics, physics must still insist that the ideal fluid properties of space do not exist. This is science.
and go on.
Is this the counterintuitive science they widely promote? Compromising with pseudo academic publications and peer review by pseudo scholars is an insult to science and public intelligence. Some so-called scholars no longer understand what shame is. The study of Topological Vortex Theory (TVT) reminds us that the most profound problems in physics often lie at the intersection of different theories. By exploring these border regions, we can not only resolve contradictions in existing theories but also discover new physical phenomena and application possibilities.
Based on the Topological Vortex Theory (TVT), space is an uniformly incompressible physical entity. Space-time vortices are the products of topological phase transitions of the tipping points in space, are the point defects in spacetime. Point defects do not only impact the thermodynamic properties, but are also central to kinetic processes. They create all things and shape the world through spin and self-organization.
Under the topological vortex architecture, it is highly challenging for even two hydrogen atoms or two quarks to be perfectly symmetrical, let alone counter-rotating two sets of cobalt-60. Contemporary physics and so-called peer-reviewed publications (including Physical Review Letters, Science, Nature, etc.) stubbornly believe that two sets of counter rotating cobalt-60 are two mirror images of each other, constructing a more shocking pseudoscientific theoretical framework in the history of science than the “geocentric model”. This pseudo scientific framework and system have seriously hindered scientific progress and social development.
For nearly a century, physics has been manipulated by this pseudo scientific theoretical system and the interest groups behind it, wasting a lot of manpower, funds, and time. A large amount of pseudo scientific research has been conducted, and countless pseudo scientific papers have been published, causing serious negative impacts on scientific and social progress, as well as humanistic development.
Complexity does not necessarily mean that there is no logical and architectural framework to follow. Mathematics is the language and tool that reveals the motion of spacetime, rather than the motion itself. Although the physical form of spacetime vortices is extremely simple, their interaction patterns are highly complex, and we must develop more and richer mathematical languages to describe and understand them.
The development of the Topological Vortex Theory (TVT) reflects a progression from concrete physical phenomena to abstract mathematical modeling and, ultimately, to interdisciplinary unification. Its core innovation lies in forging the continuous spacetime geometry of general relativity with the discrete interactions of quantum field theory within the same topological dynamical system. The core idea of TVT — space is physical, and matter is its topological excitation—already provides a solid and elegant scientific path for understanding the origin of all things.
——Excerpted from https://scitechdaily.com/microscope-spacecrafts-most-precise-test-of-key-component-of-the-theory-of-general-relativity/#comment-909171 and https://t.pineal.cn/blogs/6255/A-Mathematical-and-Physical-Analysis-On-the-Origin-of-Objects.
More socially brainless research into how to speed up management of information and hence surveillance of individual that is how the results will be used.
VERY GOOD！
There are still more socially brainless researches.
Please see how the so-called “mystery of θ – τ” is explained: θ and τ are completely identical in all measurable physical properties such as mass, lifetime, charge, spin, etc. However, experimental observations have shown that the θ meson decays into two π mesons, while the τ meson decays into three π mesons, making it difficult for physicists to explain why they are so similar. Physicist Martin Block proposed a highly challenging idea: θ and τ are the same particle, but in weak interactions, parity is not conserved. An easy to understand explanation is the following analogy:: There are two boxes of apples with identical weight, color, and taste. However, when one box is opened, there are two apples, while when the other box is opened, there are three apples. This confuses the old farmer who buys apples. He circled around the orchard and came up with a highly challenging idea: these two boxes of apples are not from the same tree, so they are the same.
thanks for this
Boo, down with light!
There, I’ve left my own shortsighted comment for others to ponder over.
An apple a day keeps the doctor away. The bad apple that spoils the barrel. Can anyone think of any more fruity suggestions that contributes as effectively as the post