Description du projet
Comment la physique quantique guide les oiseaux
Le sens magnétique des oiseaux est un phénomène connu de longue date. Les oiseaux chanteurs migrateurs nocturnes, par exemple, parcourent des milliers de kilomètres avec une précision de navigation remarquable, attribuée en partie à leur capacité à percevoir le champ magnétique de la Terre. Le fonctionnement exact de ce sens magnétique demeure toutefois un mystère. Le projet QuantumBirds, financé par l’UE, associe la physique quantique, la chimie du spin, la biologie comportementale, la biochimie et la biologie moléculaire dans le cadre d’un programme de recherche synergique unique et ambitieux. Il a pour objectif de déterminer si le principal événement de détection magnétique qui se produit dans la rétine des oiseaux implique la dynamique de spin quantique de paires de radicaux formées par photochimie dans les protéines cryptochromes.
Objectif
The navigational and sensory abilities of night-migratory songbirds, travelling alone over thousands of kilometres, are absolutely staggering. The successful completion of these magnificent voyages depends crucially on the birds’ ability to sense the Earth’s magnetic field. Exactly how this magnetic sense works is one of the most significant open questions in biology and biophysics. The experimental evidence suggests something extraordinary. The birds’ magnetic compass sensor seems to rely on coherent quantum phenomena that indirectly allow magnetic interactions a million times smaller than kBT (Boltzmann’s constant multiplied by temperature) to be detected in biological tissue. QuantumBirds brings together quantum physics, spin chemistry, behavioural biology, biochemistry, and molecular biology in a unique, ambitious, imaginative and genuinely synergetic research programme that will prove whether the primary magnetic detection event occurring in the birds’ retinas involves the quantum spin dynamics of photochemically formed radical pairs in cryptochrome proteins.
We will address three specific questions:
1. Are avian cryptochromes capable of functioning as magnetic compass receptors?
2. Do retinal neurons encode light-dependent, cryptochrome-derived magnetic information?
3. Are cryptochromes the primary magnetoreceptor molecules for magnetic compass orientation?
Success in this endeavour will: (a) revolutionise our understanding of magnetoreception, the least understood of all biological senses; (b) firmly establish the emerging field of “Quantum Biology” and thereby reduce by six orders of magnitude the threshold for sensory detection of weak stimuli in biological systems; (c) prepare the ground for the development of a novel and powerful range of bio-inspired magnetic sensing devices; and (d) provide insights that could be applied in quantum computing and guide research into the potential effects of weak anthropogenic electromagnetic fields on human health.
Champ scientifique
- natural sciencesphysical scienceselectromagnetism and electronicselectromagnetism
- natural sciencesbiological scienceszoologyornithology
- natural sciencesphysical sciencesquantum physics
- natural sciencesphysical scienceselectromagnetism and electronicsspintronics
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesmolecular biology
Mots‑clés
Programme(s)
Thème(s)
Régime de financement
ERC-SyG - Synergy grantInstitution d’accueil
OX1 2JD Oxford
Royaume-Uni