Quantum Leaps and Creative Bounds

This year marks a century since the groundbreaking development of modern quantum mechanics, a fundamental theory in physics that reshaped our understanding of the universe at the smallest scales. Its invention unlocked extraordinary innovations — such as lasers and transistors — while also revealing deep mysteries that remain unsolved. Among them is the ongoing challenge of uniting quantum mechanics with general relativity, a step toward a long-sought “theory of everything.”

Quantum physicist Kyle Eskridge of the Simons Foundation’s Flatiron Institute and New York City–based choreographer Sophia Noel have spent the last six months in conversation, pondering these types of fundamental questions in physics as part of a creative thought partnership. Part of the Open Interval Program, an initiative run by the Simons Foundation and Gibney Dance Company, these partnerships are designed to foster curiosity-driven dialogue between scientists and choreographers, giving them the time and space to think deeply together.

Join Eskridge and Noel as they sit down with Elizabeth Simolke, program manager of the Simons Foundation’s Science, Society & Culture division, for a conversation about curiosity, contradiction and collaboration — forces that will undoubtedly continue to shape the next century of discovery and creativity.

Eskridge joined the Flatiron Institute’s Center for Computational Quantum Physics (CCQ) as a Flatiron Research Fellow in June 2023. He contributes to the ongoing auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo (AFQMC) software project, which aims to provide a usable, general purpose open source AFQMC code to the scientific community. Before joining CCQ, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the College of William & Mary, where he implemented spin-orbit coupling in ab initio AFQMC and applied it to single-molecule magnets. He received his Ph.D. in physics from William & Mary in 2019.

Noel is a contemporary dancer, award-winning filmmaker and storyteller whose work blends hip-hop, salsa, swing, and ballet into dynamic, cross-cultural performances. Through choreography, writing and film, she explores movement as a universal language. After five years in Tokyo, she is now based in New York City, serving as a choreographer-in-residence at Gibney and working in partnership with ElevenLabs, a leader in AI-generated audio. Noel holds a B.A. in art history from Columbia University.