The Quantum World: From Waves to the Mystery of Entanglement
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The Quantum World: From Waves to the Mystery of Entanglement is a book on quantum physics by Zhian Jia,[1][2][3][4] published by Peking University Press in 2026.[5][6]
The book gives an accessible yet rigorous account of the strange and counterintuitive realm of the very small. It talks about the historical development of quantum theory, from the wave-particle debate over light to Planck's quantum hypothesis and Einstein's light quanta. It discusses core concepts such as the wave function, the measurement problem, the uncertainty principle, and the probabilistic nature of the microscopic world. It then extends the discussion to the quantum nature of time, the building blocks of matter including spin and the standard model of elementary particles, and finally to the frontiers of quantum information: qubits, entanglement, Bell experiments, quantum computing, and topological order. The book guides readers through a complete quantum landscape, from foundational theory to cutting-edge technology, and is suitable both for students and researchers seeking to understand quantum physics and for curious readers eager to reconstruct their understanding of reality through a quantum lens.
Contents
The book is organized into five parts. The first part, "The State of All Things," covers the entrance to the quantum garden through the odyssey of light, the wave-particle duality of quanta, and wave functions and quantum ripples. The second part, "The Order of Measurement," examines measurement, collapse and the uncertainty principle, the contextual nature of measurement, and the boundary between the macroscopic and microscopic worlds. The third part, "Time and Evolution," explores time in the quantum world, the uncertainty of time, and the causal order of past and future. The fourth part, "The Building Blocks of All Things," discusses quantum spin and identical particles, and elementary particles and the standard model. The fifth part, "The Mystery of Entanglement," covers quantum bits and the idea that information is physical, quantum entanglement and Bell experiments, quantum computing and complexity, and topological order and new states of matter.[5][6]
The following is table of contents:[5][6]
Part I: The State of All Things
Chapter 1: The Entrance to the Quantum Garden: The Odyssey of Light
1.1 Optics Before the Renaissance
1.2 The Debate Between Waves and Particles
1.3 Crossing the World of Electromagnetic Waves
1.4 Blackbody Radiation and Planck's Quantum Hypothesis
Chapter 2: The Quantum: As a Particle and Also as a Wave, Thus Should It Be Viewed
2.1 Einstein's Light Quanta
2.2 Bohr's Quantized Orbits
2.3 Wave-Particle Duality
2.4 Quantum Coherence and the Double-Slit Experiment
Chapter 3: Wave Functions and Quantum Ripples
3.1 The Wave Function and the Schrödinger Equation
3.2 The Probabilistic Interpretation of the Wave Function: Born's Rule
3.3 Quantum Tunneling Effect
3.4 Phase Space and Negative Probability
3.5 The Wave Function of the Universe
Part II: The Order of Measurement
Chapter 4: Measurement, Collapse, and the Uncertainty Principle
4.1 Observables in Quantum Mechanics
4.2 Measurement and Wave Function Collapse
4.3 Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle
Chapter 5: The Contextual Nature of Measurement
5.1 Context-Independent Hidden Variable Theories
5.2 The Mermin-Peres Magic Square Game
5.3 Quantum Non-Contextuality Inequalities
Chapter 6: The Boundary Between the Macroscopic and the Microscopic
6.1 Why the Macroscopic World Has No Quantum Effects
6.2 Quantum Decoherence
6.3 Quantum Darwinism
6.4 Measurement and Parallel Worlds
6.5 Schrödinger's Cat
Part III: Time and Evolution
Chapter 7: Time in the Quantum World
7.1 Newton's Absolute Space and Absolute Time
7.2 Einstein's Relativistic Space-Time
7.3 Time Evolution in Quantum Mechanics and Different Pictures
7.4 Quantization of Space-Time
Chapter 8: Uncertain Time
8.1 A Masterpiece of Quantum Timing: The Atomic Clock
8.2 The Time-Energy Uncertainty Relation
8.3 The Quantum Speed Limit
Chapter 9: Past, Future, and Causal Order
9.1 Superposition of Historical Paths and the Double-Slit Experiment
9.2 Feynman's Path Integral: Giving an Intuitive View of Quantum Processes
9.3 Wheeler's Delayed-Choice Experiment
9.4 The Quantum Eraser Experiment
9.5 Quantum Causal Models and Superposition of Causal Order
Part IV: The Building Blocks of All Things
Chapter 10: Quantum Spin and Identical Particles
10.1 The Concept of Spin
10.2 Identical Particles and Statistics
10.3 Bose-Einstein Statistics
10.4 Fermi-Dirac Statistics
Chapter 11: Elementary Particles and the Standard Model
11.1 Dividing the Material World
11.2 Atomic and Molecular Theory
11.3 The Search for Elementary Particles
11.4 The Standard Model and the Dream of Grand Unification
Part V: The Mystery of Entanglement
Chapter 12: Quantum Bits: Information Is Physical
12.1 Classical Information and Classical Bits
12.2 Quantum Information and Quantum Bits
12.3 Quantum Entanglement and Quantum Teleportation
12.4 The Quantum No-Cloning Principle and Quantum Encrypted Communication
Chapter 13: Quantum Entanglement and Bell Experiments
13.1 The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox
13.2 Nonlocality and Bell's Theorem
13.3 Entanglement and Nonlocality
Chapter 14: Quantum Computing and Complexity
14.1 Quantum Computers
14.2 Quantum Algorithms
14.3 An Example of Quantum Speedup: The Deutsch-Jozsa Algorithm
14.4 Quantum Complexity: The Boundaries and Depth of Computation
Chapter 15: Topological Order and New States of Matter
15.1 Symmetry and States of Matter
15.2 Phase Transitions and Symmetry Breaking
15.3 Long-Range Entanglement and Topological Order
15.4 The Toric Code
Acknowledgments
References
- ↑ "中南大学 Zhian Jia". https://faculty.csu.edu.cn/jiazhian/en/index.htm.
- ↑ "中南大学 Zhian Jia's Quantum Information and Theoretical Physics Group". https://team.csu.edu.cn/quantum/en/index.htm.
- ↑ "Zhian Jia in nLab". https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/Zhian+Jia.
- ↑ "Error: no Template:Para specified when using {{cite web}}". https://www.cqt.sg/alumni/22928/.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 (in zh-cmn-Hans) 量子世界：从波动到纠缠的物理之旅. ISBN 978-7-301-37120-6. https://book.douban.com/subject/38236303/.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 "量子世界：从波动到纠缠的物理之旅". 2026-03-01. https://www.pup.cn/bookDetail?name=%25E9%2587%258F%25E5%25AD%2590%25E4%25B8%2596%25E7%2595%258C%25EF%25BC%259A%25E4%25BB%258E%25E6%25B3%25A2%25E5%258A%25A8%25E5%2588%25B0%25E7%25BA%25A0%25E7%25BC%25A0%25E7%259A%2584%25E7%2589%25A9%25E7%2590%2586%25E4%25B9%258B%25E6%2597%2585&id=284d6e8760484352a90ee3597f0378b5.