FEAST your eyes on quantum randomness. This image, called Random Sphere I, was created by Harvard University chemist and physicist Eric Heller. It shows waves randomly and repeatedly superposed on the surface of a sphere, simulating quantum chaos.
Quantum random waves 鈥� random additions of plane waves travelling in every direction 鈥� are the quantum analogue of classical chaos. The same patterns and structures occur in standing waves in cavities, which are chaotic and governed by classical physics.
Heller constructs his images in two stages. First, he generates a raw data file from a computer simulation of a physical phenomenon 鈥� in this case, quantum random waves. From this he produces a high resolution black and white image.
Advertisement
鈥淕eneration of this raw image is semi-deterministic,鈥� he says, 鈥渟omewhat similar to what happens when an artist applies watercolour to paper. The properties of the medium 鈥� here the underlying physical phenomenon 鈥� do much of the work in creating the image, just as green pigment will fan out to look like grass when applied to wet paper.鈥�
Next he uses the graphics package Photoshop to manipulate colour and contrast in the raw image 鈥� while maintaining its original shape and form. He chooses colours with the aim of pleasing his audience鈥檚 aesthetic sense.
Heller鈥檚 images always relate to his scientific research. Since 2004 he has been studying freak or rogue ocean waves, and has created a series of images based on the complex branching patterns of energy flow that result when the waves traverse complex currents such as the Gulf Stream. Very similar patterns arise when electron waves pick a path through a semiconductor, although on a rather smaller scale.
Random Sphere I appears in At the Edge of Art by Joline Blais and Jon Ippolito, a story of how definitions of art are being challenged by the likes of engineers, programmers, biologists and architects (Thames & Hudson, 拢19.95, ISBN 0500238227).
