Engineering Is there any field that relates Quantum Physics and Engineering

[Tan Tun Jian]

Hi, i hope that i can get some information about what is the career which connects to relating Quantum Physics and Engineering. I'm thinking or perhaps having a fantasy which in the future there is not only Classical Engineering ,but Quantum Engineering. I'm a little disappointed when I heard a Physicist said that in Macro world, the effects of quantum mechanics is too minute, and there's no point in thinking about bringing quantum mechanics into actions in macro world. Is this true? However, I hope that there exists such career in the field of physics because it might give me some hope in materializing my fantasy. I hope that anyone here can introduce me to a professor or a person related to this type of career. I'm going to end my high school soon. I hope that I can confirm my future.

 

[Simon Bridge]

Welcome to PF;
Quantum computing, anything in semiconductors or lasers.
Increasingly college engineering courses are including QM and you will find QM in applied physics courses.

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=258213

 

[ZapperZ]

Hi, i hope that i can get some information about what is the career which connects to relating Quantum Physics and Engineering. I'm thinking or perhaps having a fantasy which in the future there is not only Classical Engineering ,but Quantum Engineering. I'm a little disappointed when I heard a Physicist said that in Macro world, the effects of quantum mechanics is too minute, and there's no point in thinking about bringing quantum mechanics into actions in macro world. Is this true? However, I hope that there exists such career in the field of physics because it might give me some hope in materializing my fantasy. I hope that anyone here can introduce me to a professor or a person related to this type of career. I'm going to end my high school soon. I hope that I can confirm my future.

Practically all of electronics in electrical engineering is the application of quantum physics! The field of material science (often considered to be engineering) is the application of quantum physics to materials and tightly related to solid state/condensed matter physics.

Zz.

 

[Tan Tun Jian]

Thanks for everyone's reply. Well , is there any possible to have Applied Quantum Physics in a scale with is like the human size? ( well, meaning that having a body that is a large as a human size, or perhaps larger that is controlled by Quantum Laws)

 

[ZapperZ]

Thanks for everyone's reply. Well , is there any possible to have Applied Quantum Physics in a scale with is like the human size? ( well, meaning that having a body that is a large as a human size, or perhaps larger that is controlled by Quantum Laws)

This is now a physics question, not a career guidance question.

Zz.

 

[ZapperZ]

I'm studying electrical engineering and it doesn't seem that I'm going to learn Quantum Physics. Is there something wrong with my school? It is accredited however.

Don't you deal with semiconductors at all? You may not be taught of the physics of semiconductors, but my point was that the understanding of how semiconductors work is based entirely on quantum mechanics.

Zz.

 

[f95toli]

I'm studying electrical engineering and it doesn't seem that I'm going to learn Quantum Physics. Is there something wrong with my school? It is accredited however.

No courses in "quantum devices" or something similar?
A fairly obvious example of an EE course where quantum physics would be used, would be any course where you study III-V devices such as semiconductor lasers or other "quantum well" structures. Even the "basic" design of such devices (usually based on AlGaAs/GaAs) comes down to first calculating the potential energy for each layer (which depends on the concentration of Al) and then solving the Schroedinger equation for the whole structure.

This is in fact one of the few cases where you can solve "real world" quantum physics problems by hand, it is not even very hard (ODE in on 1D).

 

[carlgrace]

Hmm... well, I can't find a course named "Quantum Physics". I'm still in first year.

Edit: It seems that I have a course titled "Solid State Physics" next semester that deals with Quantum Physics.

FYI: You'll get a very watered-down and very specific introduction to quantum physics in an EE Device Physics course. It will be one-dimensional Shroedinger Equation, then particle-in-a-box, then extension to a crystal and that's about it (you then move into Fermi-Dirac statistics and the like). Often quantum processes such as tunneling are presented as axioms that you just use. Remember the point of the course is to understand and calculate the performance of semiconductor devices, not to learn quantum mechanics.

If you want a more thorough grounding in QM, you'll need to take a course from a physics department.

 

[davidyanni10]

Materials Science & Engineering!

Especially surface science, nano-scale devices, and electronic materials.

If you like solid-state next semester then you'll like mat-sci!