by Imagine using your mobile phone to control the activity of your own cells to treat injuries and diseases. It sounds like something from the imagination of an overly optimistic science fiction writer. But this may one day become a possibility through the emerging field of quantum biology.
Over the past few decades, scientists have made incredible progress in understanding and manipulating biological systems on ever smaller scales, from protein folding to genetic engineering. And yet, the extent to which quantum effects influence living systems is barely understood.
Quantum effects that occur between atoms and molecules are phenomena that cannot be explained by classical physics. It has been known for over a century that the rules of classical mechanics, like Newton’s laws of motion, break down at atomic scales. Instead, tiny objects behave according to a different set of laws known as quantum mechanics.
For humans, who can only perceive the macroscopic world, or what is visible to the naked eye, quantum mechanics can seem very intuitive and a little magical. Unexpected things happen in the quantum world, like electrons “tunneling” through tiny energy barriers and appearing on the other side unscathed, or being in two different places at the same time in a phenomenon known as is called a superposition.
I am trained as a quantum engineer. Research in quantum mechanics is usually technology oriented. However, surprisingly, there is growing evidence that nature – an engineer with billions of years of practice – has learned how to use quantum mechanics to perform optimally. If this is indeed true, it means that our understanding of biology is completely incomplete. It also means that we could control physiological processes by using the quantum properties of biological matter.
Quantum mechanics in biology is probably real
Researchers can manipulate quantum phenomena to build better technology. In fact, you already live in a quantum-powered world: from laser pointers to GPS, magnetic resonance imaging and transistors in your computer – all these technologies rely on quantum effects.
In general, quantum effects only appear on very small length and mass scales, or when temperatures approach absolute zero. This is because quantum objects such as atoms and molecules lose their “quantumness” when they interact uncontrollably with each other and their environment. In other words, a macroscopic collection of quantum objects is better described by the laws of classical mechanics. Everything that begins quantum dies a classical death. For example, an electron can be manipulated to be in two places at once, but will end up in only one place after a short time – just as classically expected.
In a complex, noisy biological system, it is therefore expected that most quantum effects will disappear quickly, washed out in what the physicist Erwin Schrödinger called “the hot, wet environment of the cell.” For most physicists, the fact that the living world operates at elevated temperatures and in complex environments suggests that classical physics can adequately and completely describe biology: without crossing funky barriers, without being in multiple places at the same time.
However, chemists have been trying to make a difference for a long time. Research into basic chemical reactions at room temperature clearly shows that processes occurring within biomolecules such as proteins and genetic material are the result of quantum effects. Importantly, such short-term quantum effects are consistent with driving some macroscopic physiological processes that biologists have measured in living cells and organisms. Research suggests that quantum effects affect biological functions, including regulation of enzyme activity, sensing of magnetic fields, cell metabolism and electron transport in biomolecules.
How to study quantum biology
The terrifying possibility that subtle quantum effects can alter biological processes creates an exciting frontier and challenge for scientists. Studying quantum mechanical effects in biology requires tools for the short time scales, small length scales and subtle differences in quantum states that lead to physiological changes – all integrated within a traditional wet lab environment.
In my work, I build tools to study and control the quantum properties of small things like electrons. In the same way that electrons have mass and charge, they also have a quantum property called spin. Spin defines how the electrons interact with a magnetic field, in the same way that charge defines how electrons interact with an electric field. The quantum experiments I’ve been building since I was in graduate school, and now in my own lab, aim to apply tailored magnetic fields to change the spin of a particular electron.
Research has shown that weak magnetic fields affect many physiological processes. These processes include the development and maturation of stem cells, rates of cell proliferation, repair of genetic material and many others. These physiological responses to magnetic fields are consistent with chemical reactions that depend on the spin of individual electrons within molecules. Applying a weak magnetic field to change electron spins can effectively control the end products of chemical reactions, with important physiological consequences.
Currently, a lack of understanding of how such processes work at the nanoscale level prevents researchers from determining exactly what strength and frequency of magnetic fields cause specific chemical reactions in cells. Current cell phone, wearable and miniaturization technologies are already sufficient to produce tailored weak magnetic fields that alter physiology, for better or for worse. So the missing piece of the puzzle is a “deterministic codebook” that provides insight into how to map quantum causes to physiological outcomes.
In the future, fine-tuning nature’s quantum properties could enable researchers to develop therapeutic devices that are non-invasive, remotely controlled and accessible by mobile phone. Electromagnetic treatments could be used to prevent and treat diseases, such as brain tumors, and in biomanufacturing, such as increasing the production of lab-grown meat.
A whole new way of doing science
Quantum biology is one of the most interdisciplinary fields ever to emerge. How do you build a community and train scientists to work in this field?
Since the pandemic, my lab at the University of California, Los Angeles and the University of Surrey’s Quantum Biology Doctoral Training Center have organized Quantum Biology Big meetings to provide an informal weekly forum for researchers to meet and share their expertise in fields such as physics mainstream quantum. , biophysics, medicine, chemistry and biology.
It will require working within a collaborative model that is so transformative in terms of research that could have transformative implications for biology, medicine and the physical sciences. Working in one unified laboratory would allow scientists from disciplines with very different approaches to conducting experimental research that span the spectrum of quantum biology from the quantum to the molecular, cellular and organismal.
Quantum biology as a discipline suggests that traditional understanding of life processes is incomplete. Further research into the old question of what life is, how it can be controlled and how to learn with nature to build better quantum technologies will lead to new insights.
This article is republished from The Conversation, a non-profit, independent news organization that brings you reliable facts and analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. Like this article? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
It was written by: Clarice D. Aiello, University of California, Los Angeles.
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Clarice D. Aiello receives funding from NSF, ONR, IDOR Foundation, Faggin Foundation, Templetown Foundation.
