Using techniques from machine learning, University of Calgary physicists have generated measurement procedures that can outperform the best previous strategy in achieving highly precise quantum measurements.

The new level of precision approaches the limit resulting from Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, which limits the achievable precision of a measurement.

The new method uses a machine learning algorithm called particle swarm optimization (PSO), a “collective intelligence” optimization strategy inspired by the social behavior of birds flocking or fish schooling to locate feeding sites.

The new high level of precision could have important implications for gravitational wave detection.