Dear Reader,

This is my first newsletter using my new email provider, Kit (formerly called ConvertKit). I hope you like the fresh format!

The conversion process from my two previous providers, MailerLite and MailChimp, took me almost a week, but I think everything is nailed down now. One problem I had was that a couple people unsubscribed during the process and I lost track of them, so if you unsubscribed in the last month: my apologies! Please unsubscribe again, and I promise it will happen this time. Also note a new feature with Kit: you can choose to set a Preference so that you can skip getting these monthly newsletters and just get an update when I'm ready to publish a new book. See the links at the bottom of this email.

Now on to the main topic: in case you missed it, the Nobel Prize in Physics was announced last week, and it went to a trio of scientists who developed a series of experiments to show quantum effects at a visible scale. Quantum physics deals with phenomena that occur at the level of individual atoms and subatomic particles. Such phenomena are not observable at a macroscopic level that we can see, such as a ball that is made up of millions of atoms.

For example, a ball will bounce back every time you throw it at a wall.

But if you toss a single particle at a wall, sometimes it will tunnel through the solid wall. But we can't see such a thing with our eyes.

What these scientists (John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret and John M. Martinis) did that won them a Nobel was to develop a way to show these quantum-level events in a way we can see. They started with the concept of Cooper pairs (no, not named for Sheldon Cooper) which are pairs of electrons in a superconductor that match up their energy levels and act as a single wave function. They extended this concept to get a whole bunch of these Cooper pairs to act as a single particle.

That's probably about as far I should go trying to explain this, but you can read a much better explanation on the Nobel Prize website here. Some physicists think this development is as significant as Erwin Schrödinger's famous thought experiment with the cat, for which he received the Nobel in 1933. That was just a thought experiment, an absurd situation meant to show how quantum theory can reveal astounding new concepts. This current experiment is actual hardware showing quantum effects at a macro level.

One more quick bit of science news, in case you missed it: NASA scientists are considering using nuclear bombs to push an asteroid off its collision path, not with the Earth (that would be the plot of the movie Armageddon), but the moon. There's a slight chance this asteroid could hit the moon in 2032, so they're looking at possible plans to deal with that. Stay tuned.

What's Rick Reading Now?

I mentioned last month that I was finally reading Neal Stephenson's The Mongoliad. I've now finished Books 1 & 2, and have started Book 3. It's led me to watch NatGeo's six-part documentary on the Mongols, since there's a lot of history here I'm not familiar with.

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Promotions (free stuff and more!)

For those of you with Kindle Unlimited:

Rescue on Gimhae from Earl T. Roske is the first book in his series "Stories of the Orphan Corps," and it's available free on Amazon! If you love a good military adventure, crossed with sci-fi worthy of Andre Norton and Asimov, then check out Rescue on Gimhae.

Happy Reading!

Rick A. Allen

The Star Riders series: