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URBANA, Ill. – It was 10 pm and we were locked in a room in the mall.
It's been a long day. I was woken up at 5 am to finish writing an article. Then I had spent a day talking to students and professors from the University of Illinois. The physics department had invited me, along with two other science editors, to visit, with the aim of helping science and engineering students better explain their work.
I had a few glasses of wine at dinner.
And now I was in a locked room at Lincoln Square Mall, trying to remind me of my old education in physics to get out.
The four of us, plus Phillip Schewe, a long-time science writer; David Ehrenstein, publisher at the American Physical Society; and Karin Dahmen, professor of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign – have had an hour to understand everything about a missing scientist.
The fate of the free world was at stake. Of course. This video presents our mission.
Paul Kwiat, another physicist at the University of Illinois, is the creator of this escapist piece, which is one of the few, perhaps the only, to contain riddles based on science.
"Science can be fun," he said. "Normally, people do not include science and fun in the same sentence."
Four years ago, Dr. Kwiat, who is studying how to exploit the properties of light for future quantum computers and encrypted communications, was attending a conference in Switzerland. He searched online for something fun to do outside of normal hours.
The top rated destination on TripAdvisor was not a hiking trail, nor a historical or cultural event, but an escape room. He and a colleague went. None of them had been in or out of an escape room before.
"It was superfluous," said Dr. Kwiat, although they were not able to resolve all of Sherlock Holmes' problems in a timely manner. During the same trip, he went to another escape room in Prague. (He is now 25 years old.)
He thought that someone should design an escape room with scientific puzzles, and when the American Physical Society launched a call for "an innovative approach" he started working on one himself.
For the birthday of his girlfriend, Dr. Kwiat has developed a small test version. In the spring semester, he recruited undergraduate students into a class that he taught to tweak puzzles and build more robust copies. He rented a space in the mall, a former baby items store.
He wrote a story: The fictional Alberta Schrödenberg professor achieved a breakthrough in quantum computing while he was working for a government agency, the Disruptive Technology Office. But she feared that enemy agents would come closer to steal her discovery.
Then she disappeared, leaving behind a secret laboratory with mysteries to solve.
"For me, the best evacuation rooms are those that have a good history," said Dr. Kwiat. "There's a good reason you're locked in a room, and there's a good reason why there are puzzles, and there's even a good reason why people give you tips to solve them. . "
Before entering, we received several sheets describing some fundamental properties of light. We skimmed information on different wavelengths of light, including radio waves and X-rays, and on the refractive law describing the bending of light at the entrance of light. a material like water or glass.
Dr. Kwiat stated that it was not essential to memorize all this knowledge, but that it was good to look and keep in mind.
In the room we went.
In the end, a training in physics does not necessarily help. I am a former graduate student who left Illinois a quarter of a century ago without my Ph.D. after deciding that I was better able to ask other scientists what the answer was.
David Ehrenstein and Phil Schewe both completed their doctorate before deciding that they preferred the communication component of physics. And Karin Dahmen is a professor of physics.
But we lacked the traits of accomplished accomplices. This included a methodical organization – make an inventory of everything in the room – and concentrate. Communicate clearly with your teammates; do not be distracted
Dr. Schewe, for example, began to run through a stack of old Physics Today magazines in a library. "Phil!" I said exasperated. "Stop searching for your articles!" (Tip: Do not waste time reading magazines, but you may want to take a closer look.)
In designing LabEscape, Dr. Kwiat presented vision previews that resemble computer-generated special effects, but instead manipulate real-world material phenomena.
To avoid spoiling the riddles of future laboratory escapees, think of a plastic tank that once hung in LabEscape's home area.
There, Dr. Kwiat took advantage of the optical alchemy of acrylic and corn syrup.
At first glance, the tank was clear and apparently empty. But wear a pair of 3D IMAX glasses and three-dimensional letters spelled LabEscape, lined with psychedelic colors, appeared suddenly in front of you..
The tank was not empty, but filled with 18 gallons of corn syrup. The letters, acrylic, were also there. But since both materials have about the same refractive index, the light passed from one to the other without bending and the letters were almost invisible.
But corn syrup is also what scientists call "optically active" because of the shape of its sugar molecules.
Polarized light – where the oscillating electric fields of photons are aligned in parallel, like aircraft flying in formation – was directed into the tank. As the light passed through the syrup, the polarization turned. (Think of airplanes that perform barrels in synchronism.)
The blue light turns about twice as much as the red light. Because acrylic is not optically active, the rays that crossed the letters – and passed through the syrup less – looked different. orientation.
Your eyes do not perceive polarization, but a polarizing filter in the IMAX glasses has made the colorful invisible.
The sign is no longer there, because Dr. Kwiat has neglected another fundamental property of corn syrup: its density is greater than that of water. Under the weight of the extra weight, the plastic is broken, releasing a sticky deluge.
The evacuation room was a learning experience for Dr. Kwiat in other respects.
A puzzle is to extract a key to open a lock to get another index. Dr. Kwiat devised the solution, but was surprised when a participant discovered another way to get the key.
Then, someone discovered a third way and someone else found a fourth way. Eventually, he stopped being surprised. Now, breakout room players have come up with 18 different methods to get the key back.
A report once you have finished your time locked in the room lets you glimpse fascinating information. Did you know that your digital camera can capture infrared light that your eyes can not see? I did not do it.
And there was really a federal agency called Disruptive Technology Office. Dr. Kwiat even got a grant.
But he does not expect people to be aware of the refractive index or the operation of a laser.
Instead, Dr. Kwiat hopes that participants will better understand how scientists find beauty and admiration by deciphering the universe.
"There is a great feeling of triumph when you overcome one of these riddles," he said. "Just like in science."
Erica Phillpott, a fitness club receptionist, took her six children aged 10 to 19 to LabEscape. At first, while she was looking at the scientific information sheets, she was nervous.
"I just paid this man to add extra stress in my life," she recalls. "None of us really know anything about science."
But Ms. Phillpott and her children managed to get out of the room. "We saved the world," she said.
After, his 12 year old daughter, whose birthday they were celebrating, was passionate about science. She now thinks that she would like to study forensics or something similar.
"She really made the most of it," Phillpott said.
Even with student turnover at the university, there are probably not enough clients to keep LabEscape active in Urbana indefinitely.
Mr. Kwiat plans to transfer him to a science museum of a big city and hopes that a company investing in quantum computing research – Google, perhaps, he said with nostalgia – could sponsor him.
The goal is not to bring visitors to a science museum to try an escape room, but on the contrary: to bring the fans of escape to visit a science museum.
With regard to the three scientific writers and the physicist, we, uh, did not solve all the problems and, when our time was up, were banned in the "quantum domain".
But it was a fun way to end the day.
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