Hello, and welcome back to Impact Quantum. And your ears do not

deceive you. I am not Bailey. Bailey is on holiday because, yes,

even AI agents need to take a break. Down this episode,

we get into some very interesting discussions around

quantum chemistry and its implications for medicine, science,

and, well, just about everything. So I also get to

geek out because at one point in the past, I was a chemical engineering major,

so brought back a lot of memories. So here's the

show, and no dubstep this time. Hello, and welcome back to

Impact Quantum, the podcast. We explore the emerging field of quantum

computing, where you don't need to be a PhD in physics,

but it probably helps. You just need to be a little curious. Right. And the

most quantum curious person I know, and maybe even the most curious person I know

is with me. Candice. How's it going, Candace? It's great. Thank you so

much. The sky is blue. The sun is shining. It's just going to be a

beautiful day today. I'm very excited. Nice, nice. We're recording this as I'm on the

west coast for Microsoft Ignite. And it

is. I can. I can smell the. The fresh Pacific air,

and it's about 20 degrees warmer than it is at home. So all

the locals are saying how cold it is, but I'm loving it. You see, it's.

It all depends on where you come from. Right? It's all relative. Exactly.

So today we are lucky enough to be speaking with

Natasha Nadavisa. I definitely mispronounce

the last name. I apologize. And she is involved

in nuclear quantum dynamics. Hi,

Natasha. How are you today? Hi. I'm really good. Thank

you for inviting me. Cool. So

the obvious question is, what exactly is computational

and quantum chemistry and what does nuclear physics have to do

with it? Because most people. I think I know the answer, but most people, when

they think of nuclear physics, they think, you know, nuclear reactors, nuclear weapons, that sort

of thing. Yeah, well, I mean, that's also what

is nuclear physics. But in this case, with nuclear quantum dynamics,

we usually refer to. Well, first, quantum dynamics. It's

basically the study of systems which evolve in time.

Ergo, dynamics following the quantum

laws. So basically, we are solving the equations of motions which are

derived from quantum dynamics, from quantum mechanics. And

the nuclear is just to say that we are following, in this case, the motion

of nuclei. So in my particular project, we are

working on studying chemical reactivity. So we are

studying how the bond in the molecule will break, but we

are following the motion during this process of the nuclei.

Interesting. And I. Can those be Used to do copied

computations.

Well, I mean in, in this case we are using still the classical

computers to do quantum dynamics. Whether or

not it can be done on the quantum computers, if that is

your question, that is one of, probably one of the most

promising applications. But I don't really know much about

that particular field. So it is

as far as I know, it is still under the development.

That's cool. When we were preparing for the call, you had mentioned to me

that you had recently completed your PhD work. Congratulations on

that. That's a very big deal. I'm very

curious at what moment early in your,

I want to say in your education, once you hit university, at what moment

did you realize that this was the field that you wanted to commit yourself

to? Well, I guess

that was at the end of my master studies because in principle I have

a background in chemistry, so I was always interested in

how we can understand the world around us at the molecular level.

I kind of very naively thought back then that we can understand everything

if we understand the behavior of molecules. Now

it's not really everything, but it is still quite a lot.

And as I had a background in experimental chemistry, in

principle of organic chemistry, biochemistry, synthesis and

analysis. When I first started learning about

the quantum mechanics, which was quite late in my studies when

I got into this field, I realized that in principle, if we

can do this kind of calculations, we can follow the behavior of

molecules and it's very nature and it's very core. And

that was kind of like the more underlying level of if we understand

how this very basic behavior influences the molecules and we can

understand how the molecules difference is much more bigger processes

and then we kind of can do this stepwise understanding of

different phenomena. And that's when I got interested

into this in this particular field of quantum dynamics.

And I. Well,

you work at the intersection of this deep theoretical

chemistry and I want to

think about real world applications. What do you think is the

biggest challenge in translating quantum level

simulations into deployable

industrial tools? Well,

the thing is that I would say the biggest challenge that we are

facing is the size of the system which we can study at this level of

theory. In my particular case, I was working in a very small

molecule, methane, which is basically the smallest possible

carbohydrate that you can have. And we were studying the breakage of a CH bond

in that molecule. And even when you have a very, very small system,

it can, it can get very computationally difficult because there is a lot of

parameters to take into account if you want to have this very high level of

theory. And on the one hand there is

importance because if we can understand on such level

how the energy is flowing through the system, how the energy is actually being

used, then it can have a very important industrial application because this,

this particular reaction is still the main route to produce

hydrogen. And then if we could understand better how to control this

process with much smaller input of energy and the much smaller

cost of the process, we could actually have much

bigger gain. But the problem is, in order to understand this on such

a high level of theory, we can work on a very small system.

Because if we would want to increase the size of the system, if you would

want to, let's say if you have a metal as a catalyst,

it also affects the process, but if it wants to take into account also movement

of these atoms, the system would grow exponentially and it wouldn't really be

doable anymore. So there is always this balance in between

how accurate answer we want and how big of a

question we can ask to get that accuracy.

And that has been what they say is classically

intractable problems in computer science. And this is the idea

that quantum computers are able to

address those problems more effectively. Not all problems, but just some

problems. Unfortunately the, some of them, some of those

problems are really important. Whether it's, you know, chemistry, kind of

everything we experience in life has something to do with chemistry. Right?

Ourselves has to do with chemistry. What do

you, you know, what is

the potential here for drug discovery and like

side effect mitigation and things like that? Like, is that one of

the top

advantages of this technology, you could simulate that?

Well, in principle, I would say if

you talk about the accuracy, then also we need to take into account, as I

mentioned, the size of the system. Because if the system is quite big, then

these quantum effects might not play such a significant role. So when it comes

to drug discovery, if you're talking about the molecular processes, when we have, for

example, let's say we have this

specific part of the enzyme, which I'm pretty sure your

future guest will explain much better. But if we have something which can

be, let's say presented with the, on a much smaller scale,

then these effects might be much more relevant, obviously. But

if you say, if you talk the,

as you mentioned, the side effects of the drugs, now if we talk about,

I would say again, it's not really my field, but I would imagine the side

effect might have to react on a much bigger scale

because side effects would be, we don't really know where it will be. It could

be Affecting some of different organs. So then we would need to take

human organism as a bigger, let's say the,

the hole. And I probably wouldn't have so emphasized

molecular effects. But still this kind of simulations I

think could be still improved by the quantum computing because

it doesn't necessarily need to be on the molecular, on the molecular level.

It can also be for different kinds of simulations, can be

sped up and different kind of simulations have different problems in terms of

computational efficiency. Interesting.

So if you could, you know, pick a problem,

what is there like an unsolved problem that keeps you up

at night where you say I really hope one day to explore

or help answer. Is

there any type of problem like that that you could, you could mention?

Well, one of the things that I find very interesting is that usually when we

talk about quantum dynamics, we either study the movement of

electrons or as a chemist in a chemistry or the movement of

nuclei. But what I think it would be very interesting if we

could study, let's say the chemical activity by following all of those

elements, if they would all move at the same time. Now this is something which

is computationally very difficult and I don't know if there

is any potential of it actually being possible anytime soon,

but I feel like if that would be possible, it would be really amazing because

then we could gain much better insight into for example, chemical activity or

molecular behavior on a much more

accurate, in much more accurate way.

Interesting. But it's not just medicine, right? I mean

we could create better fuels, better batteries. Right. There's

all sorts of potential here. Does any one of

those in particular interest you?

Well, I would say I'm the most interested in

biological or medical applications, but as you mentioned,

in principle most of the things are in the end chemical. For example, if we

want to talk about reducing the, the co emission

then I, as far as I know there are, there's a lot of research where

how this can be captured or converted into something

or how the fuels are going to be burned or a lot of those processes

in the end. Or lots of catalytic catalysis.

Catalysis and a lot of different reactions in

a lot of processes are actually depending on the chemistry.

So you mentioned catalytic and catalysis, which oddly enough,

that's a harder word. Catalytic is easier to say.

I actually, fun fact, started my college career to be a chemical

engineer, but I switched to computer science and

I think, I think I remember. But could you explain what catalytic

processes are for those who are not chemistry aware? Not

that I'm chemistry aware, I just, I hear the terms, I'm like, oh, I remember

that talk. Yeah, yeah, I remember that. So what exactly is catalytic?

Well, in principle in chemistry, when you have a chemical reaction, it will involve,

let's say, the breakage of a certain bond. Now in order to break a bond,

you have an energy of activation. You need to give some energy to the system

in order for this bond to be broken. Now the catalytic

process is usually some third party, let's say, which is participating

in this chemical reaction and it just serves to reduce this

energy barrier. So it's in this sense helping the chemical

reaction, in a sense that you don't need to put that much of energy to

break, let's say, a bond. But this activation will be much

lower. And a lot of processes

that are important could be quite expensive by, without a catalyst or even

not possible. Which is why there is always a need to

investigate which kind of material will be most efficient in this.

Yeah, that makes sense. Most people I think, know that word catalytic from their

cars and catalytic converters. Yeah, I'm not really sure

what that is. Oh, it's something that they put on. I don't know

exactly what it does, but it meant to clean the emissions. And it's basically

when the exhaust pipe goes through, it goes

through the muffler to reduce the sound. But it also goes in called a catalytic

converter to scrub some of the particles from it or break

down some of the bonds. So it's not as the emission is not as toxic.

I'm sure someone will tell us in the comments, Candice, exactly what a catalytic converter

does. But yeah, I had mine stolen off my car

when I. And they tend to get stolen a lot because I think historically

they, they use platinum in them.

So they were inherently expensive. They used to be like a couple of thousands of

dollars to fix or replace. But I think they've changed

the formula. So it's. If you get it on newer cars, they're

not, they're not made of as expensive material and as a result the

thefts are not as important. So typically, yeah, but I think about

5, 10 years old cars will start having the platinum in them.

So we've talked a lot about chemical reactions,

we've talked about enzymes. I'm wondering if you could explain

just at the very base, basic level, what

happens during a chemical reaction to someone who's never

taken any chemistry and doesn't really understand it. How can

you describe it? Okay, well, the first thing that

one needs to understand is that there is a molecule, right. And the molecule

contains different atoms. And these atoms are

bonded in a certain way. Now the chemical reaction in principle means that

some of these bonds will be broken and some new bonds might be created.

So the structure of the molecule itself will change. That's

the. Let's say that in the most basic way

that's fair. So let me ask you, so in

what are you looking for when, what does quantum

mean in the context of chemistry? Are you, are you like expecting

like molecules to be dancing around or interacting? Like, what are

you looking for when you're running these kind of simulations?

But depends on the kind of simulation. If you're looking at this, for

example, what I was working on with the chemical reactivity,

what we have there is that we wanted to study what is the probability

of a bond being broken. Now there is a lot of experiments that are done

and now the experiments are getting very advanced in

one can prepare actually a quite precise quantum state of a molecule.

Now the quantum state we, as you said, the molecule,

in this case, if we talk as a single molecule, which probably will be

single, but the, the, all of the bonds are vibrating. The

molecule is also rotating a bit, as you said, it's like dancing around. And

then if they are all dancing at the same, with the same energy in the

same way, we say it's the same quantum state. And

then. Okay, sorry, go ahead. No,

no, go ahead. I had a light bulb moment. So like I.

Okay, it's good, it's good, it's good, right? Things are making sense, you know?

Yeah. So. So the experiment would be depending on what

kind of quantum state we prepare, how is the chemical reaction going to go?

What is the. The goal is always if we want bonds to break, then

the goal is to prepare such a state so that the probability of bond breaking

is the highest possible. Right. So in this sense, when

we do this simulation, that is exactly kind of what

we do. We try to follow the evolution of a

molecule of a specific state. And in the theory, we can

prepare this specific state much easier than experiment. Because in experiment you have a

lot of molecules and then there is a quite complicated apparatus to prepare

it in a quite uniform state. And it's not going to be quite.

It's not going to be exactly uniform. But if there could be as close as

possible, then we can. Experiment is more. More precise.

But in theory we can much easier than which was one

single state and just see how the molecule will

evolve going from there. So now

I kind of forgot about your question. But the point of the simulation in this

sense would be to See, what are the different

effects that are affecting the probability of this bond being

broken? And the reason why we need quantum

effects here, it's not only necessarily that there might be some quantum effect.

Now, the most famous one is tunneling. And of course, when you're breaking a CH

bond, where you have a hydrogen and carbon, the hydrogen is

quite small, it's quite light, and it can have the tunneling, meaning that as

I mentioned earlier, there is this activation energy. And this

molecule, this atom doesn't really need to go through this whole barrier. It

can go. It can tunnel through it. So the reaction can happen at the lower

energy than it would, which is one of the

quantum effects, but which. Could save a lot of money in energy

consumption if you needed. If you figured out how those. Those tunneling effects

work. Okay, that makes sense to me now. Sorry.

Two. Two light bulb moments. Two light bulb moments

after. After a very long, exhausting week. That's good. My brain does still work.

Okay. So. But what I wanted to say, it's not only about the quantum effect.

It's also that if you want to understand, even without the quantum effects, even without

the tunneling, he wants to understand how exactly this process is going.

It's much better if we could study it, if you could apply the

mathematical equations, the models, that actually corresponds to the nature of

our system, which is why we do quantum dynamics in this case,

because the way the atoms are behaving in the molecules,

they're following this. They're not following the classical laws of physics.

Okay. And to that point, what's something surprising that you've

learned about how the molecules behave that most people

would never guess?

Most surprising way. Well, I would say one of the

surprising way is that the way the molecules use the

energy. Because I think that's.

I think that's what surprises the people is that the levels are quantized,

which means that the molecule cannot be in. If

you talk, for example, about the vibration of a bond, right? So

if you have, let's say I have two balls and they are

vibrating, they could be vibrating in any different way. But if you go to

the quantum level, then not every. There is. Not every state

is, let's say, possible because the states are quantized. So it can be in

one quantum state or it can be in another. But what is in between

is just there isn't the state in between. It's kind of like, I

remember learning this when I was a young lad,

or at least a younger lad, that it's kind of like

steps and stairs, right? You You. You

really can't be in between the steps, Right. You

know, you have. You can't stand in between the steps. Right. You can.

You know that. That analogy works better. Right. So, you know, kind of all those

states in. In between the. The. The individual,

I think electrons, I don't know if it applies to other

particles, too, can only be in certain orbits in certain. Certain places.

So that is one of the, for me, I thought was one of the great

mysteries, like. Well, you know, in our physical world. Right. Like, you know, when I'm

going up the stairs, I exist at some point and every

level there. But at the quantum level, it almost like, for lack of

better term, pixelates, you know? Yeah,

that's what people say, that the levels and the general state, they're like

quantized. So they are there. There are specific. I mean, there are

states, but they aren't continuous.

That blew my mind when I heard that. Still

does.

This stuff is so fascinating to me. What do you think people misunderstand.

Misunderstand most about chemical reactions, how

they actually work in nature?

Well, I'm not quite sure if people actually think about

chemical reactions.

I. I haven't encountered many misconceptions.

So I don't know, maybe you can tell me what you think about chemical reaction

and I can tell you if it's a misconception or not.

Well, we keep on going back to photosynthesis and quantum

tunneling, and that is just not something

I ever thought about photosynthesis as something

that was quantum. But then how, you know, the light is

reacting and the changing of the molecules and creating these. These

chemical reactions, I found that to be incredibly fascinating. It's

not something I saw in the first

place, is that. So that was something that had

surprised me. And the other thing, too, that I really respect about plants,

which sounds like a weird statement, is the fact that they are

little. Every leaf is a little solar panel. But they've also figured out

the energy storage mechanism, right? So they store

it basically as sugars or some kind of sugar. Right. And

that can be, you know, metabolized later or burned later, depending on what

words you want to use. I think that's amazing because the biggest problem,

I think, with solar panel or renewables today is the energy storage.

And, you know, right now, I think most people think of those

as separate things. Solar panels, right? You can. You can slap a solar panel on

anything, but you don't get the most use out of it

unless you find a way to store that energy. And pushing that energy

into the grid has A lot of other logistical problems for the power

company. So it's not, I think if I

had to answer the question, what is the most

common misconception? It's people don't understand that

these things are complicated. Right. These things have connections. Right. So

most people, you know, we'll say, well, we'll just put solar panels in every month,

everything. Well, that's great. But when the sun is out, you're generating a lot of

power and that disrupts kind of how the grid can kind of

adjust the power levels and things like that. So it's not as simple as just

slap on a solar panel. Right. You have to find a way to store that

energy for later. Plus it. The sun never shines at night. Right. So

unless you're in a north pole or south pole. But

you know, for the most part, I think, I think people don't understand. I think

it kind of is like kind of what you said. Right. People don't think about

this. Right. And chemistry is literally involved in

everything we do. Yeah.

But in principle, a lot of this research in like let's

say this artificial photosynthesis or solar panels is actually inspired by

nature. Because you said nature usually figures the most elegant way to, to

do, well, basically everything that we could possibly think of.

So the only matter is trying to understand how it actually works in nature. What

are the. How the nature regulated and solve these and then

to try to somehow recreate our own solution and to try to adapt it

to what we need to do it for.

That's interesting. Where do you think quantum effects matter most in

our real lives? That in our bodies, in materials,

in energy or something else? What do you think?

Yeah, that's the question I get a lot when I tell people what I'm working

on, because my thesis was about the quantum effects in this. And then people

are like, but what are quantum effects? And like, are they any relevant? Because

usually people think about the quantum. They think about the very,

let's say electrons and atoms. And that doesn't seem to be very

relevant to the world we are living in because it's just so much smaller

and we cannot really see, we cannot interact with it. But I would

say in principle that could play probably a very

significant role in a lot of processes.

If we go to elementary level, like

for example, the way we see things or the way our

senses work or, well, in principle,

chemical reactions, is that, say, probably the, the most obvious one.

But a lot of those things, even though they are on

the very, let's say small level, they could still have effect on

much bigger scale. Okay,

so can you explain to me why in quantum. Can quantum

chemistry explain and help me understand why certain

reactions happen quickly while others barely happen at all?

Oh, well, probably. I mean, it's

kind of. Well, actually for the. With the quantum chemistry, people

usually refer to, let's say, calculating electronic structure, which is basically

calculating the energy of a given structure of a molecule.

So I don't know if that first, if there is an approach

that would be applied directly to reactivity. But this is extremely important

because if you want to understand how usually in

chemical reaction, as you mentioned, whether it will happen or not, it can depend

on many different things. But the main things are depending on the energy, how does

the energy flow, how does the energy change if you're going from one

state to another? And then if you want to understand how these things are

happening, then you would have to know exactly at this state, what exactly

is the energy? Because sometimes differences could be not that, not

that big. And especially if you have different competing reactions.

For example, if you have a lot of different

processes that would go at the same time, then the question is, well, which

one will go faster and which one will go. Which one will be

energetically more. More favorable. So for all of those

questions, one would need to have a quite precise calculations.

And that's where the quantum chemistry can play a role.

Interesting. What is

an enzyme? Because I

remember the answer, and there were things that always bothered me

about how they work. But what is an enzyme, basically?

I mean, as much as I probably remember, as much as you do from. The

biology class, I'm sure you remember.

As far as I remember, enzyme is in principle, in biology, doing what

the catalyst is doing in, well,

chemical reactions, which are not biological. So it is helping chemical reactions.

It is the kind of participating. Participate in the reactions

too, right? That was the thing that blew my mind. Like, they, they. That's what

I remember that blew my mind was like, well, they're involved, they make things

easier. They lower the energy state. Again, I guess going back to what you said,

right? Nature always finds out a pretty elegant way, right? My favorite line

from Jurassic park, the, the original was, life finds a way,

right? No, like. And that blew my mind

because it seems like it almost seemed. And I know it

doesn't because it can't. Like, it almost seems like it violates the,

like, thermodynamics because it's like it lowers the energy

state. It doesn't participate. I don't know. That's the part that always blew my

Mind. Right. Like, I don't want to go down too far in this rabbit hole,

but, you know, I don't talk to chemistry PhDs very often. So

like, I always, you know, and there was a previous show we had where I

was like, you know, lasers were finally explained in a reasonable

way. And I was so excited about that. Like. But anyway.

So how does quantum chemistry

change your understanding of everyday things in life, like

color, smell, light?

Well, I mean, quantum chemistry is very broad field,

so it, it can be

applied to, to different, let's say, aspects of our

life. But I don't know if

we could, if. If it's enough to use only quantum chemistry and to use

only that kind of study to change the things that you

mentioned about the smell or the how the

baby. See, I think there's much more processes involved there, and I would

say it does certain contribution, but I don't think that

it actually solves. It provides the full answer to

something, you know, so big as a.

Such a. About the questions which depend on so many different

processes.

Fascinating. All this is just fascinating, right? I mean, like,

you know, people. People think

science is boring. A lot of people. Not all people. No one on this call,

obviously. Right. But like, it's just so

fascinating. Like, you know, there's just so much

to it that can explain so many things. You know, the thing that when I

was a kid I learned that just blew my mind was things

that are good heat insulators tend to be good electrical

insulators. And things that are conduct heat pretty well tend to be very

good electrical conductors too. Right. Like, so the idea that glass can

kind of, you know, be like a. Doesn't transfer

temperature very easily, but metal does, right? So, you know,

I don't know. For me, like, that was the thing that was like, well, why

is that? Like, and you start pulling at the threads. And you start pulling at

the threads and you get. Ultimately you get down to the molecular level of like,

why that is. Right? And I guess, you know, now you can go down to

the submolecular level of like. Well, why is that? Right.

It's just. It's just one of those things where,

yeah, I'm like, it's a cool field. Like, it's not.

It's not for the timid, that's for sure. Because there's a lot of. There's a

lot of everything. There's a lot of math, there's a lot of rules to memorize,

but there's a lot to it. But like, you know, I feel like once you

kind of get a sense of like,

you know, chemistry. You can understand a lot more things. Like

it's kind of like it really is at that bridge of. It's like a junction

box, so to speak. Right. Of physics, biology and

yeah, I guess quantum physics too, right. Like it all touches on that.

Yeah. But as I said, it's like what is the most

fascinating for me in this field is that it's never like

one study or one approach that provides some very

significant answer. It's usually a very complex interplay of different

research groups working on something on different people from different background. It's

like a lot of small inputs about something, A lot of looking at the same

problem from a lot of different perspective, asking different questions which are

sometimes complementary. And then in the end we kind of

build a picture and try and manage to explain some phenomena

which are in the world around us.

Very cool. Have you ever run a simulation that

completely challenged your assumptions?

Usually the simulations that I was running had so many technical

issues that it's not like you run a

simulation, you ask a question, you run a simulation, you get the answer and then

you're mind blown how cool this answer is. It's mainly like the simulation

fails and then you have to figure out why did it fail and

then you kind of try to figure out at what

moment. Because especially in the simulations that are multi step, so you

have to do one calculation, then the other, then the other. Then there

is also freezer group, as I said, involved. And then when you put it in

the end you get the result and then you can you try to analyze this

result and then it's usually trying to understand whether if it's

meaningful physically or was it some numerical artifact

or. So I would say it's. Most of the work is

actually trying to debug things or trying to understand what

was some issue that didn't work well, that affected

everything. Let's say it's a quite challenging field,

especially in some situations where it's not that easy to

compare with experiment. Because when we talk about this particular

field that I worked on, there is a lot of experiments. But the

thing is that the conditions of the experiment and the theoretical model are quite

different. And then there's all different theoretical models, but they all have

different assumptions and they are like, you know, they're just

not the same. They're always. There's always

something which we cannot. If you compare them and we get the same result, we

can be quite. It's quite suspicious because you don't expect them

to be the same. So in that sense, it could be quite challenging

to. Sometimes, at least in my

project, it could be quite challenging to understand if

the model worked well or was there some numerical

artifact or some instability. And then there is a lot of testing

and a lot of changes and a lot of kind of, you know,

computational work just to try to see if the results are meaningful or

not. In the end. Is

there actually a. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Frank. No, no. I think it's all fascinating.

It's all good. Sorry, I was just curious. Is there a quantum concept out

there that still feels kind of mysterious or. Or hard to wrap your

head around? Yeah, most of them,

for me. No, I mean, we laugh, but, like, that's important, right?

You're obviously very accomplished. You're very smart. Right. You just got your PhD.

Congratulations, by the way. If

you find it hard, people who are regular

civilians shouldn't feel bad about it being

difficult. That's kind of. I see that as a positive. Right. I see

that as a positive sign. I think if you think about

it as a whole, it's complicated to everyone. I don't know if there is

someone who can say, okay, I understand everything. Maybe there are people who

are more experienced in these domains, but I would say it's

so broad, and usually people tend to focus on something

smaller. As I said, I worked on this specific project and I

gained some expertise and knowledge in this specific project. But I would say the most

important thing is, just, as you mentioned, to be curious, because you will probably never

understand everything. And especially if you decide to do research, you will

work on the things that you don't know how to do because they just. No

one knows how to do them. And then in the end, of

course, you will learn along the way and you adapt.

But one shouldn't be scared of not knowing things. It's

completely normal. Also, it would be boring if you would know everything already.

And I was just thinking, you're not going to do research in the stuff that

people already know. Right. Or that you already know. Right. Like, it's a.

It's one of those things where by definition, it is by definition, a

you're not going to know. And even Richard Feinman, who is

legendary, said, if you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't

understand the quantum mechanics. Right. It is. It is something that,

until someone can explain all the weirdness, makes no logical

sense to our, you know, our

part to our world. Right. Like, you know. And that's an interesting question. Right. So,

you know, you think about like the world humans occupy, right. Our day

to day, you know, and there's things bigger than

us, right. There's a fancy word for all these things. I forget what it was,

was. But basically there's like planet size things,

solar, galaxy sized things. Right.

It's all underlying the same laws of physics, we think. Right,

but like those will behave differently than, you know, me tossing a baseball, you

know, down the road or whatever.

And at the subatomic scale, like those rules are a little different too.

Right. Like it's a different game. And you know, our brains evolve to

understand this level of reality. Right. So it's kind of like may not

things. May things don't have to make sense for them to be true is basically

what I was trying to say. Yeah. And I could say that's probably one

of also the main problems in this domain is that we are kind of used

to learning things intuitively, especially when it comes to physics.

Everyone understands the forces because everyone was pushed at some point in their life.

So we kind of can grasp these concepts without much of

mathematics because we are just experiencing it in everyday life. But when it comes

to quantum, those laws are quite different. And then if people try to

understand it intuitively, they could either misunderstand it or they could

just get super confused. Especially if you try to visualize something, it's like just,

it's just too difficult to visualize things. So. And

that's probably creating a lot of friction if people start to like,

let's just say and just get acquaintance

or learn this field because it's just, it

doesn't work as other sciences do when they can do things

intuitively. So is

there something in nature, a smell, a color,

a biological process, a flame, that makes

you think this is quantum chemistry in action?

I think there is a. But then again, it's

in again, if we go on the very end of the process when we

perceive things, when the light hits the, the eye, I think

in the very end there is a sort of isomerization of one molecule.

And that, as far as I know, is one of the examples of

quantum processes which are kind of key process or at

least one of the key processes in the way that we can actually see the

world around us. Okay,

very cool. I'm

sorry, go ahead. Oh, go ahead. I'll say if you could describe quantum chemistry

using a metaphor from art or music or

any metaphor, what would it be?

Quantum chemistry. That's an interesting

question.

Well, I mean, I would say quantum chemistry

as such would be, I don't know how to explain the. The

whole field. But let's say if we focus

on. Perhaps if you focus

on quantum dynamics. But I still. I don't know. I mean, I would have to

think about it a bit. A bit longer. That's fair. Okay.

We don't want to put you on the spot. Yeah, yeah. It's. I mean, there's

so much. I mean, it's. I can see why you would like this field or

anyone would like this. Feel like there's just so much. There's just so much

to think about and so much to. To research. Right.

Mm. There's so many problems to solve.

Right. I mean, and this just seems so

exciting, you know, Quantum chemistry, quantum biology, like,

you know, Frank, I'm obsessed. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I. I

just. There's just so many questions that I have that I want to understand.

So, you know, what's like a. What's like a

typical day for you, like when you're studying quantum

chemistry and what it. What does a day look like for you?

Well, I would say the main problem in the domain was

how to express the data efficiently because this kind

of simulations are usually. One needs a huge amount of

data. And we were working a lot with the tensor networks, with

the tensor methods, really, and trying to do kind of tensor

decompositions and try to kind of compress the data. But

then the problem is that when you compress the data, we also kind of lose

the accuracy. We might. So most of the typical

day, it kind of depends on which stage of the project it was

and what kind of the problem we are working on. But I would say the

typical day would be trying to understand why something failed and

how to make it work. Interesting.

Interesting. No, it's all very fascinating. And tensors. Right.

So let's talk about that. Tensors are very popular in the AI field, which is

what I do currently for my day job. They are also

something that a lot of hardware companies are

optimizing for. Do you. Do

you. What do you, you know, when you're doing research or doing anything

computational, do you use GPUs, do you use kind of cloud or

is you. You focus more on kind of like the. The actual

chemistry and the beakers and the pouring of stuff?

Well, I was using mainly the supercomputers, so

it's. Yeah. In front, there are a couple of

supercomputers which are kind of of a different level.

Some of them belong to university, some of them are national. So most of the.

These kind of simulations are happening there. I didn't work with the GPUs myself,

although there are also available. But in

principle for this kind of simulation, of course one cannot run it

on a local computer. So one needs to have some more

computational infrastructure which can support such kind of calculations.

Right. Not just a really good gamer PC card. You

need one of those supercomputers. That's interesting.

What's next for you? I see we're coming close to top of the hour, so

I want to be respectful of your time. What's next for you? Like what, what

are you doing now? You just got your PhD. You know, they used to be.

Candace, you remember these like the, you just won the Super Bowl. What

are you going to do next? I'm going to Disney World. Going to Disneyland. But

yeah, that was like these commercials, they stopped that about 15

years ago. So I don't know if anyone else remembers it, but. So like, what's

next for you? You just were. We're in the stadium and I go to you

and I say, you just got your PhD. What do you do now?

Well, I put a lot of thought in what I want to do next. And

in principle I'm explor options in industry

because I kind of trying to decide what kind of research would I like

to do because I would like to still continue doing a research. And then there's

this big question between research in industry and research in private, in, in

academia. What are the differences? What are the similarities?

And I would say I kind of found that

I would prefer to focus now on

more applied other. I wouldn't say more applied is a correct term,

but let's say more of application of a research to building something that

can actually be tangible and that can, you know, end up being

some sort of a product and have some impact which is more visible now

and not a bit less visionary than it is in academia.

So at the moment, yeah, I'm exploring different options and

following the trends which are currently. But what is going

on in the, in the research and private sector.

Very cool.

This has been absolutely fascinating. I'm really happy that we had you on as a

guest and I'm even. Happier that we recorded it this time.

No, we can't, we can't keep going back. That was a terrible mistake.

Thank you so much for inviting me. It was really nice to talk to you.

Where can folks find out more about you and what you're up to? Do you

have a website? Do you have LinkedIn or research? Okay, I

have a LinkedIn. Yeah, I thought about creating a website, but I kind of

never got around to do that, but I would say the LinkedIn would be the.

The best place someone wants to connect or to just discuss

a bit more about whatever science that would be the

best place, I would say.