Three ways quantum has changed your life

If you studied at King’s, you walked hallways rich with the legacy of quantum science. Professor James Clerk Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism paved the way for quantum science. And Professor Peter Higgs predicted the existence of an invisible quantum field that permeates everything, everywhere in the universe – a field confirmed in 2012 with the discovery of the Higgs boson particle.

A black line drawing of a person standing and looking down at a mobile phone in their hands.

A simple black line drawing of a satelite with two rectangular solar panels, a circular body, and an antenna emitting signal waves.

An icon of an MRI machine with a person lying on a table being moved into the cylindrical scanner.

While quantum science may feel complex and removed from our daily lives, you interact with it every day.

Your phone: Computers used to fill huge rooms and have very limited power, until scientists applied quantum principles to control the flow of electrical currents and create transistors. Today, every time you use your laptop, phone, TV or smartwatch, you’re harnessing a bit of quantum magic.

GPS: Calculating distances and pinpointing locations via satellite relies on precise timekeeping. Atomic clocks inside satellites use the predictable quantum behaviour of atoms to measure time with extreme precision. So next time you find a route home or locate the nearest coffee shop, give a little nod of thanks to quantum science.

MRI scanners: Hydrogen particles inside our soft tissues are hypersensitive to the environment around us, as a result of their ‘quantum spin’. MRI scanners temporarily knock these hydrogen atoms out of alignment and then allow them to realign, showing up areas with more hydrogen atoms, and areas with less. The resulting detailed images are a cornerstone of modern medicine.

If you studied at King’s, you walked hallways rich with the legacy of quantum science. Professor James Clerk Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism paved the way for quantum science. And Professor Peter Higgs predicted the existence of an invisible quantum field that permeates everything, everywhere in the universe – a field confirmed in 2012 with the discovery of the Higgs boson particle.

While quantum science may feel complex and removed from our daily lives, you interact with it every day.

Your phone: Computers used to fill huge rooms and have very limited power, until scientists applied quantum principles to control the flow of electrical currents and create transistors. Today, every time you use your laptop, phone, TV or smartwatch, you’re harnessing a bit of quantum magic.

GPS: Calculating distances and pinpointing locations via satellite relies on precise timekeeping. Atomic clocks inside satellites use the predictable quantum behaviour of atoms to measure time with extreme precision. So next time you find a route home or locate the nearest coffee shop, give a little nod of thanks to quantum science.

MRI scanners: Hydrogen particles inside our soft tissues are hypersensitive to the environment around us, as a result of their ‘quantum spin’. MRI scanners temporarily knock these hydrogen atoms out of alignment and then allow them to realign, showing up areas with more hydrogen atoms, and areas with less. The resulting detailed images are a cornerstone of modern medicine.

But what is quantum?

While the consequences of quantum science are all around us, we can never really ‘see’ it. That’s because the quantum realm exists at the microscopic level – at the scale of tiny particles like electrons and photons – a place where things behave in ways we wouldn’t expect.

Keep scrolling to enter the quantum realm...

Welcome. Down here, things don’t quite adhere to the rules of classical physics. Particles exhibit strange behaviours – behaviours that you just wouldn’t see in day-to-day life.

But what is quantum?

While the consequences of quantum science are all around us, we can never really ‘see’ it. That’s because the quantum realm exists at the microscopic level – at the scale of tiny particles like electrons and photons – a place where things behave in ways we wouldn’t expect.

Keep scrolling to enter the quantum realm...

Welcome. Down here, things don’t quite adhere to the rules of classical physics. Particles exhibit strange behaviours – behaviours that you just wouldn’t see in day-to-day life.

'In the quantum realm, everything that happens depends on everything else that could possibly happen. And the mystery of quantum science is that when you look hard enough to work out what's going on, things stop behaving in a quantum way.

'The consequences of this are weird. Quantum particles can pass through seemingly impenetrable barriers driving nuclear reactions, or be linked to each other across huge distances, allowing teleportation of information over thousands of kilometres. Such behaviour is so far from our everyday experience of the world, but when you get comfortable with it you can really start to understand how everything works and build incredible technologies.'

– Dr James Millen, experimental quantum scientist at King's

Sound confusing? It is. The greatest physicists of all time don’t pretend to fully understand how nature works at the quantum level. But we know quantum already affects everything in the world, and that we can harness its weirdness to achieve things that would otherwise be impossible.

King’s Quantum – small stuff, big impact

The possibilities of quantum technologies are so profound that governments around the world are investing heavily. In recognition of its potential and integral role in our futures, the UK Government has committed £2.5 billion to quantum science over the next 10 years.

As one of the UK’s top universities for physics, King’s is also committing to our quantum future. We’re a perfect incubator for the kind of collaborative innovation that makes quantum magic happen. We’ve just invested £45.5 million to power exploration across the sciences, and launched our new research centre, King’s Quantum .

King’s Quantum brings together:

Quantum experts: Researchers with deep knowledge and understanding of quantum science and its potential applications.
Quantum adopters: Researchers from across the university who lead the world in their field – from surgical robotics to global security – and want to understand how they could harness the power of quantum.
Quantum collaborators: Partners within industry who help bring together academic knowledge with technological innovation to accelerate progress – from young companies like Kvantify who are embedding a team of quantum computing experts in King’s, to large corporations like BT with the resources and connections to get quantum technologies adopted on a huge scale.

King’s Quantum – small stuff, big impact

The possibilities of quantum technologies are so profound that governments around the world are investing heavily. In recognition of its potential and integral role in our futures, the UK Government has committed £2.5 billion to quantum science over the next 10 years.

As one of the UK’s top universities for physics, King’s is also committing to our quantum future. We’re a perfect incubator for the kind of collaborative innovation that makes quantum magic happen. We’ve just invested £45.5 million to power exploration across the sciences, and launched our new research centre, King’s Quantum .

King’s Quantum brings together:

Quantum experts: Researchers with deep knowledge and understanding of quantum science and its potential applications.
Quantum adopters: Researchers from across the university who lead the world in their field – from surgical robotics to global security – and want to understand how they could harness the power of quantum.
Quantum collaborators: Partners within industry who help bring together academic knowledge with technological innovation to accelerate progress – from young companies like Kvantify who are embedding a team of quantum computing experts in King’s, to large corporations like BT with the resources and connections to get quantum technologies adopted on a huge scale.

Finding the right cures, faster

Quantum computing holds the tantalising prospect of rapidly revealing the complex genetic mutations that cause diseases like cancer. It has the potential to simulate the behaviour of thousands of drugs in the body at a molecular scale and find life-changing new treatments in seconds. This will make diagnoses faster and more accurate, enabling truly personalised healthcare and more.

King’s researchers are already pushing the capabilities of quantum computing to improve human health. Our drug design chemists are working with industry quantum computing experts to vastly speed up the design and testing of new drugs, for conditions ranging from COVID-19 to strokes, and Alzheimer’s to Parkinson’s.

'New drugs can take a decade or more to be approved. During the pandemic, we used a quantum-inspired device to rapidly screen chemical compounds and found several existing drugs – already approved for human use – which would be useful in treating COVID-19. Developing this capability more broadly will not only help us identify effective drugs during times of crisis but also accelerate access to effective treatments for patients who otherwise have little hope of seeing a cure during their lifetime.'

– Dr Rocio Martinez-Nunez, Reader in RNA Biology and Immunity in the Faculty of Life Sciences & Medicine

Elsewhere at King’s, researchers are exploring quantum-powered simulation of blood flow in the heart. This could allow doctors to precisely ‘test drive’ different treatments on their patients more efficiently, revealing in advance which treatments are most likely to work or cause unexpected side effects.

Quantum computing – is it possible?

A truly quantum-powered computer would make today’s AI models blush. It could harness quantum parallelism - that is analysing many different solutions at the same time - to perform calculations with startling efficiency, from devising new chemical reactions to optimising complex global supply chains. Quantum computers could also work hand-in-hand with AI models to reduce their high energy consumption.

So why aren’t quantum computers sitting on every desktop? Mohammad Mousavi, Professor of Software Engineering in the Faculty of Natural, Mathematical & Engineering Sciences, explains:

‘You could install a quantum computer today, but for large-scale systems you need substantial facilities and maintenance, such as powerful fridges, to maintain cryogenic temperatures for certain types of quantum computers.

‘There are also challenges with errors creeping in using current quantum computers. At King’s, our research is helping to improve the reliability of the quantum computing infrastructure, with a focus on software. One of our projects involves developing software that automatically corrects issues arising as programmers use a quantum computer – something that’s very difficult to do yourself, unless you’re a quantum expert! Automating these kinds of quantum fixes will be essential if we want to see more widespread use of quantum computers.’

Ultrasensitive sensors

The applications of quantum science go much further than just computers. Levitation is one area of quantum research where King’s is leading the UK. And no, it’s not just a cool magic trick.

‘Quantum behaviours are very delicate and sensitive. This is a double-edged sword: on one hand, we can use the sensitivity to detect tiny forces, like the magnetic field from a single neuron firing in your brain. On the other, it means quantum devices are extremely vulnerable to noisy environments, like external temperature or vibrations.

'That’s why we levitate quantum things – suspend them in a vacuum, not touching anything else. This isolates our devices from disturbances so we can better probe the things we are interested in.'

– Dr James Millen

By harnessing the power of levitation to reduce the external ‘noise’ acting on particles, King’s researchers are developing a next generation of quantum sensors – able to detect the tiniest of movements with unparalleled precision, speed and accuracy.

These ultrasensitive sensors could bring pin-sharp precision to medical imaging, enhance navigation in autonomous vehicles, detect subtle changes in global climate, or optimise production lines in manufacturing. With true ‘quantum-level’ sensitivity, they could even detect the magnetic field from your brain, observe the exchange of individual light particles during photosynthesis, or search for mysterious dark matter across the universe.

Keep a (sub-atomic) eye on what’s next

In true quantum style, we can expect to see it creeping covertly into more and more technologies over the coming years. As you see devices becoming quicker, more clever, more powerful… ask yourself whether quantum science is working its mysterious, minuscule magic.

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WRITERS

Kelly Archer
Paul Brooks
Hermione Cameron
Kate Hazlehurst
Teresa Richards
Alex Scott
Karina Scuteri
Ellie Stone
Stephanie Young

DESIGN

Principal design by Jonathan Vickers
Additional design and coding by Carly Yung
Approved by brand@kcl.ac.uk
Photography by Nathan Clarke and Jim Winslet

WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO

JH Norris

ALUMNI & EDITORIAL OFFICE

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InTouch is published by the University’s Philanthropy & Alumni Engagement Office. The opinions expressed in it are those of the writers and not necessarily those of the University.

If you have a story for our Autumn 2025 issue, email us at forever@kcl.ac.uk

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