Quantum Effects Go Macro: Collaboration Unravels the Ultra-Quantum Realm If you shrank yourself down to the scale of an atom, the world would become a curious place. In this quantum realm, particles can be in two places at once, electrons can be connected regardless of distance, and fluids can flow without resistance. In other words, physics at such scales behaves completely differently than at the scales we normally experience. Yet recent discoveries have shown that sometimes microscopic quantum phenomena can leak into the everyday. These findings have launched interest in ultra-quantum matter — the materials that show these large-scale quantum behaviors, which have the potential to revolutionize future technologies, such as superconductors and quantum computers. With its wide-ranging implications, ultra-quantum matter has drawn the interest of physicists from diverse backgrounds, including high-energy, quantum-information and condensed matter physics. In recent years, physicists from these different backgrounds have realized that some of the specialized projects they have been working on are actually probing the same core questions. “It turned out that we were just using different language or different techniques,” says theoretical physicist Ashvin Vishwanath of Harvard University. “We found that some of the barriers we were up against were artificial, and we could benefit from just talking to each other.” Following that realization, Vishwanath and a group of researchers formed the Simons Collaboration on Ultra-Quantum Matter. Launched in 2019 with 17 theoretical physicists and dozens of postdoctoral researchers and graduate students from around the world, the collaboration is part of the Simons Foundation’s efforts to boost research into fundamental problems in mathematics, theoretical physics and theoretical computer science. “We’ve found that because of the specialization in physics, people don’t interact enough across disciplines,” says theoretical physicist Nathan Seiberg of the Institute for Advanced Study, who joined the collaboration in 2019. “I