The research, published in Nature Communications on September 29, 2026, draws on topological photonics, a field that borrows concepts from topology, the branch of mathematics concerned with the properties of shapes that survive deformation. Topological ideas have already transformed condensed matter physics, explaining why certain materials conduct electricity flawlessly along their edges while insulating in their interiors. Photonics researchers have spent more than a decade trying to import the same robustness into light-based systems, designing devices in which light is forced to travel along protected pathways that ignore defects and sharp bends. What distinguishes the Maryland work is the platform: rather than fabricating intricate photonic microchips, Dutt and his colleagues achieved the first demonstration of these topological principles on a fiber-based platform, embedding the physics into the very glass strands that already span the globe.

The team’s building block is the microresonator, a microscopic bump sculpted onto the surface of a glass fiber with sub-nanometer precision using ultra-precise lasers. On its own, a single microresonator can trap and circulate light in a well-defined mode. Chained together, these bumps interact in a carefully engineered sequence, and by linking 21 of them along a single fiber the researchers created what they describe as a specialized, one-way optical highway. Light traveling along this highway is steered around obstacles and prevented from degrading or scattering, much as a protected lane keeps traffic flowing past construction sites. The one-way character is the topological signature: because the pathway is defined by the global pattern of the structure rather than by any local detail, small imperfections cannot easily reflect or divert the signal.

The pivotal experiment centered on a hybrid boundary. By carving different patterns of microscopic bumps onto different regions of a single glass fiber, the researchers created a microscopic border where two distinct light-guiding arrangements meet. On one side of the boundary, the structures follow one pattern; on the other, a different one. What happens when a light wave encounters this border is far from obvious. Depending on the topological character of each side, the wave might freeze in place, bounce backward, or flow smoothly across. Predicting the outcome required the team to develop an entirely new mathematical blueprint, a formula that tells scientists whether light will be trapped at the boundary or transmitted across it, granting them total control over the signal’s fate.

This theoretical framework is what elevates the work from a clever fabrication demonstration to a genuine design tool. In conventional photonic devices, engineers rely on trial, simulation, and iterative refinement to understand how light moves through complicated structures. The new formula provides a direct, predictive rule for multiband topological heterojunctions, the junctions between topologically distinct regions that the team created on what is known as the surface nanoscale axial photonics platform. With such a rule in hand, researchers can deliberately engineer junctions that transmit, reflect, or localize light on demand, opening a route to reconfigurable optical circuits written directly into fiber.

The practical advantages over existing technology are substantial. Traditional advanced microchips used for routing light are fragile and expensive to manufacture, and once fabricated they cannot easily be altered without relying on power-hungry components that constantly drain energy to maintain their configuration. The new fiber-optic devices invert that trade-off. If changes are needed after fabrication, scientists can simply hit the fiber with targeted laser heat to reshape the microscopic bumps, trimming the structure to a new specification with minute spatial precision. Once trimmed, the configuration is stable and requires no further energy to maintain. Dutt, who has spent fifteen years experimenting with photonic microchips before beginning this collaboration, noted that these unique capabilities of microbumps, such as adaptable trimming and measurement with minute precision in space, are quite beneficial compared to microchips.

Durability and efficiency extend beyond the reconfigurability. The glass fibers suffer almost zero signal loss, and they can handle complex light signals without requiring the heavy cooling systems or bulky vacuum chambers that burden other advanced quantum hardware. That combination, low loss, ambient operation, and compatibility with the existing fiber infrastructure, is exactly what network engineers seek as traffic volumes climb and quantum technologies begin to demand channels capable of preserving delicate optical states. A platform that protects light from the imperfections of the real world, while remaining compatible with the cables already in the ground, could shorten the path from laboratory physics to deployed systems considerably.

The collaboration itself reflects the breadth of expertise the platform demands. Alongside Dutt, the team includes Dashiell Vitullo, a physicist at the Army Research Laboratory, and Nathaniel Fried, a University of Maryland doctoral candidate and Department of Defense SMART Scholar. The work was conducted in Dutt’s Fearless Optics, Quantum Engineering, and Technology Laboratory, housed at the university’s A. James Clark School of Engineering, where Dutt holds faculty positions in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Institute for Physical Science and Technology, as well as at Army Research Laboratory facilities. The research was carried out under a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement between the University of Maryland and the U.S. Army through its Combat Capabilities Development Command, a partnership that pairs academic photonics innovation with military communications needs.

According to Vitullo, the breakthroughs achieved by the team could enhance the speed and reliability of military communications networks, pave the way for quantum navigation sensors that do not rely on GPS, and support the simulation of advanced materials. The navigation application is particularly striking: quantum sensors that exploit the properties of light and matter to measure motion and rotation with exquisite precision could offer an alternative to satellite-based positioning in environments where GPS signals are jammed or unavailable, and robust fiber-based optical systems are natural candidates for carrying and processing the fragile signals such sensors require.

With the fundamental physics now proven on the fiber platform, the researchers are already looking toward what comes next. Beyond the microbumps themselves, the team plans to explore nonlinear optical behaviors, exploiting the unique properties of light to create synthetic dimensions, engineered degrees of freedom in which light can be made to propagate as if occupying extra spatial directions. Synthetic dimensions would allow researchers to manipulate multiple aspects of light simultaneously, vastly increasing the amount of information these fiber systems can carry. If the topological highway demonstrated here proves as robust in deployment as it is in the laboratory, the humble glass fiber, already the backbone of global communications, may gain a new layer of mathematical protection that keeps the world’s data flowing smoothly through an imperfect physical world.

Subject of Research: Topological photonics on fiber-based platforms for robust light control in optical communications

Article Title: Optics breakthrough could yield swifter communications

Article References: Optics breakthrough could yield swifter communications. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: topological photonics, fiber optics, microresonators, optical communications, University of Maryland, Nature Communications, topology, photonic chips, quantum sensing, synthetic dimensions, signal robustness, Army Research Laboratory

The urgency of the modeling work is rooted in the epidemiological reality already unfolding across the nation. Measles is one of the most contagious human pathogens known, and the numbers reflect that extraordinary transmissibility. Co-author Abba Gumel pointed to a striking 650 percent increase in cases between 2024 and 2025, a surge that has accompanied steadily declining vaccine coverage. So far this year, 3,471 measles cases have been confirmed nationally, spreading across 45 states as well as Washington, D.C., and New York City. Recent clusters in Texas, New Mexico and South Carolina emerged as those states slipped below their respective vaccine-induced herd immunity thresholds, the minimum proportion of a population that must be immune to interrupt sustained person-to-person transmission of the virus.

To assess what might happen if Florida repeals its school-entry requirement, the Maryland team constructed a transmission model calibrated on the 2025 measles outbreak in Gaines County, Texas, one of the most significant recent U.S. outbreaks. The researchers then layered in Florida-specific demographic structure, real MMR vaccination coverage data, and realistic mixing patterns across age groups and geographic areas. This approach allowed the model to capture how measles would actually move through Florida’s population rather than relying on simplified assumptions of uniform contact. The result is a computational framework capable of projecting outbreak scale, trajectory and severity under different policy and vaccination-coverage scenarios.

The model’s baseline finding is sobering even before any policy change is considered. According to the simulations, Florida’s vaccine-induced herd immunity threshold is already below the level needed to protect the state against sustained measles transmission, meaning the population’s collective immunity has eroded to a precarious point. When the researchers then simulated declines in MMR vaccination coverage following the removal of school-entry requirements, the potential for large outbreaks increased further, with projected pediatric deaths reaching numbers not seen since the pre-vaccine era. In other words, the state is not starting from a position of safety; the proposed repeal would push an already vulnerable system past a critical threshold.

One of the study’s most technically significant insights concerns the unequal impact of vaccinating different age groups. Oveson reported that vaccinating one child is three times more effective at reducing transmission than vaccinating one adult, a difference that stems primarily from how age groups interact. Children spend considerably more time in face-to-face contact than adults, whether in classrooms, playgrounds or other shared settings, and this contact structure makes them disproportionately important nodes in the transmission network. The practical consequence, she emphasized, is that small reductions in childhood vaccination rates can produce disproportionately large increases in the scale of outbreaks, a nonlinear relationship that policymakers may underestimate when weighing the perceived costs of mandates against their epidemiological benefits.

Oveson likened the current situation to wildfire risk, describing it as having a very dry forest with a lot of kindling. A large unvaccinated population that includes children, she explained, is the perfect setup to spark a very big and potentially deadly outbreak. The analogy captures a key feature of measles epidemiology: the virus’s basic reproduction number, among the highest of any human pathogen, means that even modest pockets of susceptibility can sustain explosive chains of transmission once the virus is introduced. In a population where immunity is unevenly distributed, those pockets can connect through schools and households, converting isolated introductions into widespread epidemics.

Gumel placed the findings in a longer historical context, noting that school-entry vaccination mandates for various infectious diseases have long been a cornerstone of U.S. public health policy and have proven to be an effective tool for preventing both disease spread and disease-related mortality. What is most troubling, he said, is that these mandates are known to effectively prevent the erosion of herd immunity. He also identified complementary measures: strengthening adult immunity through catch-up vaccination could help reduce the severity of outbreaks, and as-needed behavioral interventions such as masking and isolation could slow transmission. Crucially, however, he stressed that neither of these approaches can compensate for declines in childhood MMR coverage, underscoring the unique protective role that school-entry requirements play.

Florida’s policy environment adds further concern. The state has resisted behavioral measures in the past and already offers exemptions for individuals who decline vaccination for religious, personal or medical reasons. Vaccine exemption requests in Florida currently stand at 5.9 percent, well above the national average of 4.2 percent. Oveson argued that eliminating the school mandate would go a step further by signaling that vaccination is unnecessary, a message she described as inaccurate and dangerous. The new paper, she noted, provides quantitative evidence that such a policy change could make measles endemic in Florida, meaning the virus would circulate continuously within the state rather than appearing only in sporadic imported outbreaks, and could potentially reignite transmission across the entire United States.

Behind the numbers lies a shifting landscape of public attitudes. Recent national survey data show that approximately 16 percent of parents are not confident that the MMR vaccine is safe for children, 17 percent believe the risks of the MMR vaccine outweigh its benefits, and 18 percent fully oppose school-entry MMR vaccination mandates. Oveson argued that health officials would benefit from a better understanding of how people make vaccination decisions, particularly parents deciding on behalf of their children. Gumel agreed, emphasizing that targeted outreach is critical. Public health officials, he said, need to find ways to reach these parents if they are to prevent or contain future measles outbreaks wherever they occur, and he added that such outbreaks will occur, because the disease is out there, vaccination coverage is down, children are returning to school, and the data and science do not lie.

The study arrives at a moment when the scientific community is watching the erosion of one of public health’s greatest achievements. Measles elimination in the United States, declared decades ago after the widespread adoption of the MMR vaccine, depended on maintaining high and sustained childhood immunization coverage, and the Maryland model demonstrates how quickly that foundation can weaken when policy signals change. By quantifying the projected effects of removing school-entry vaccination requirements, the researchers have converted an abstract policy debate into concrete epidemiological terms: outbreak scale, transmission persistence and preventable pediatric deaths. Whether Florida’s lawmakers heed these projections or proceed with repeal, the study offers a rigorous, data-driven preview of the consequences, and a reminder that in the mathematics of infectious disease, small changes in vaccination behavior can cascade into outcomes of historic magnitude.

Subject of Research: Mathematical modeling of measles transmission in Florida under proposed repeal of school-entry MMR vaccination requirements

Article Title: Study foresees heightened measles epidemic risk for Florida

Article References: Study foresees heightened measles epidemic risk for Florida. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: measles, MMR vaccine, Florida, herd immunity, vaccination mandate, epidemiological modeling, vaccine hesitancy, public health policy, outbreak projection, school-entry requirements, transmission dynamics, University of Maryland

The problem the researchers set out to attack is deceptively simple to state. Quantum field theories, the mathematical frameworks underlying the Standard Model of particle physics, describe nature in terms of fermions, the matter particles such as electrons and quarks, and bosons, the force carriers such as photons and pions. While fermions map relatively naturally onto qubits, bosons are a nightmare. A bosonic field lives in an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space, meaning it can host any number of excitations at any energy. To squeeze such a field into a finite collection of qubits, one must truncate that space, keeping only a limited number of occupation levels per site. That truncation introduces errors that grow with both the energy of the excitations and the simulation time, and the qubit overhead required to keep those errors under control can balloon dramatically. For simulations of high-energy collisions or long-time dynamics, the cost becomes prohibitive even for quantum computers.

The Maryland team’s insight was to stop fighting this mismatch and instead embrace hardware that speaks both languages fluently. Their machine is a chain of ytterbium ions held in a blade-style radiofrequency trap, a platform of the kind that has been refined over two decades since the pioneering proposals of Cirac and Zoller and the Mølmer–Sørensen gate scheme. Each ion carries long-lived hyperfine states that serve as qubits, encoding the fermionic degrees of freedom of the theory. But the ions also vibrate together in collective motional modes, and these harmonic oscillators are, mathematically speaking, genuine bosonic systems. Instead of digitizing a bosonic field into qubits, the experiment lets the phonon modes themselves carry the bosonic field, with occupation numbers that can in principle extend far beyond what a modest qubit register could represent.

Operating this hybrid device requires a rich gate set that goes beyond ordinary qubit operations. The experiment implements pure qubit gates for the fermion sector, pure bosonic gates that displace and manipulate the phonon modes, and, crucially, mixed qubit–boson gates that couple the two sectors. The fermion–boson interaction is realized through a simultaneous red and blue sideband operation: laser pulses tuned to the motional sidebands of the qubit transition entangle the internal state of an ion with the displacement of a shared vibrational mode. Acting on an initial vacuum state, such an operation produces an entangled state of the form of a superposition of spin-up paired with one coherent displacement and spin-down paired with the opposite displacement. This is precisely the kind of qubit–boson entanglement that the Yukawa interaction, the model under study, demands.

The target of the simulation is the (1+1)-dimensional Yukawa model, a simplified cousin of the theory that describes how nucleons interact by exchanging pions, the lightest mesons in the nuclear realm. Hideki Yukawa introduced this interaction in 1935 to explain the short range of the nuclear force, and the model remains a touchstone for nuclear theorists. In one spatial dimension and one time dimension, the theory captures the essential physics of fermions coupled to a scalar boson without the full complexity of three-dimensional quantum chromodynamics. The team simulated its non-equilibrium dynamics, meaning they prepared the system in a simple initial state and watched it evolve in real time, a regime that is notoriously inaccessible to the Euclidean lattice Monte Carlo methods that dominate classical computations in nuclear physics.

The specific dynamical scenario they chose is particularly punishing for conventional quantum hardware. Starting from an empty bosonic field, the Yukawa interaction populates the field with high-occupation bosonic excitations as the fermions interact and exchange energy with it. On a qubit-only device, faithfully representing these high-occupation states would demand a large number of qubits per field site, and truncation errors would corrupt the dynamics precisely in the regime of interest. On the trapped-ion machine, the phonon mode simply absorbs the excitations natively. The experimental results effectively captured these high-bosonic-occupation states, demonstrating that the hybrid approach reaches territory that would otherwise be out of reach for a device of this modest size.

Extracting meaningful numbers from the phonon register required clever measurement techniques. To determine the probability distribution of bosonic occupation numbers in a given motional mode, the team probed the oscillator with an auxiliary qubit using a red sideband pulse. As the pulse duration varies, the probability of finding the qubit in its excited state oscillates in a way that encodes the populations of the individual Fock states of the oscillator. By fitting the measured excitation probability as a function of pulse time, the researchers reconstructed the full phonon number distribution at each simulated time step, verified against exact classical simulations of the small system sizes accessible, and supplemented with noise modeling to understand how gate imperfections shaped the observed data.

The work builds on a rapidly maturing research program at the intersection of nuclear theory and quantum information. Davoudi and collaborators had previously laid out the vision of a hybrid analog–digital approach using controlled phonon–ion dynamics for quantum field theory simulation, and the same collaboration recently simulated the phase diagram of one-dimensional quantum chromodynamics on a quantum computer. The broader field has seen parallel advances, including qudit-based simulations of lattice gauge theories, parametric excitation schemes for synthetic gauge theories in ion traps, and a growing theoretical literature on hybrid oscillator–qubit processor architectures and their instruction sets. The new experiment is among the first to run a genuine interacting fermion–boson field theory on hardware where the bosons are physical oscillators rather than encoded qubit registers.

The significance of the result lies in where it points rather than in the size of the system simulated. The Yukawa model studied here involves a small number of fermionic sites and a handful of bosonic modes, well within the reach of exact classical calculation. But the resource scaling argument is the real story: because the bosonic register is native, the qubit count grows only with the fermionic degrees of freedom, and the truncation errors that plague qubit encodings of bosonic fields simply do not arise. As the fermion sector scales up and additional phonon modes are brought into play, the simulation approaches the regime where classical methods become genuinely challenging. Trapped-ion platforms already support programmable phononic networks and coherent coupling between multiple mechanical oscillators, suggesting a plausible hardware path toward larger field-theory simulations.

There remain substantial hurdles between this demonstration and simulations of real nuclear scattering processes. Gate fidelities, phonon decoherence and heating, and the complexity of compiling long Trotterized time evolutions all impose limits, and the team’s own noise simulations show how imperfections accumulate over the course of the dynamics. Error correction for bosonic modes, an active area of research with codes designed specifically for oscillators, will eventually need to be integrated into such hybrid processors. Still, the experiment marks a conceptual milestone: a quantum computer that treats matter and force carriers on their own native terms, using qubits for fermions and phonons for bosons, has now simulated the out-of-equilibrium birth of a bosonic field. For a community aiming to compute, from first principles, the reactions that governed the early universe and still power the hearts of stars, that is a result worth celebrating.

Subject of Research: Hybrid qubit–phonon quantum simulation of Yukawa quantum field theory dynamics

Article Title: Quantum field theory dynamics on a spin–phonon quantum computer

Article References: Than, A. T., Kadam, S. V., Vikramaditya, V., Nguyen, N. H., Liu, X., Davoudi, Z., Green, A. M., & Linke, N. M. (2026). Quantum field theory dynamics on a spin–phonon quantum computer. Nature Physics. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-026-03402-4

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1038/s41567-026-03402-4

Keywords: quantum simulation, trapped ions, quantum field theory, Yukawa model, phonons, qubits, nuclear physics, bosonic fields, Nature Physics, hybrid quantum computing, non-equilibrium dynamics, University of Maryland