A well known example of the Wigner flow is the motion of magnetic domains, which is followed with Barkhausen noise.

Soooooo... How's the weather?

Nice!

@ Valeria: "A well known example". Right... the article linked on that page is where the figs and the examples of the text is from, is their first detail study ("Wigner
flow has so far not been studied in detail") and is dated Aug 2012.

This is pretty much the press release of a published version. I think there has to be some societal response to these methods, and their examples, among scientists before they are ascertained to be "well known" respectively "(valid) examples".

But quantum physicists have not given up entirely on phase space. The study of the next best thing, the movement of quantum physics' phase space-based probability distributions has actually boomed in recent years.
It is interesting to note that even we know that we cannot measure the momentum and position with a greater accuracy of the uncertainty principle, but the problem is that why it is so, or what is its mechanism? Maybe this physical view could help us to understand it.
http://www.vacuum...19〈=en

there has to be some societal response to these methods

Phase space flow is here about some time already. It's sometimes called the Wigner-Liouville flow. It has its topic at Wikipedia - so I presume, it's well recognized approach between specialists.

Soooooo... How's the weather?

No seriously. Did the author of this article even consider defining even one of his terms for a non-PhD audience? The piece spoke of a "system's behaviour" without even giving an indication of what sort of system they are speaking of. Don't they have news groups for physicists and mathematicians to discuss their work where everyone has their educational background? This is analogous to a network using a prime time national news show to have pundits discus circuit diagrams--and not even telling the audience what the device they are discussing is for.

Soooooo... How's the weather?

No seriously. Did the author of this article even consider defining even one of his terms for a non-PhD audience? The piece spoke of a "system's behaviour" without even giving an indication of what sort of system they are speaking of. Don't they have news groups for physicists and mathematicians to discuss their work where everyone has their educational background? This is analogous to a network using a prime time national news show to have pundits discus circuit diagrams--and not even telling the audience what the device they are discussing is for.

Agreed... no heads, no tails, too short for any meaningful understanding

Did the author of this article even consider defining even one of his terms for a non-PhD audience?

Why should he? His paper is written for a grad student/PhD audience. It's not his job to put this in laymen's terms (which can't be done without generating major misunderstandings on the part of the laymen because they are missing the fundamentals of quantum mechanics)

It's the job of those WANTING to understand such a paper to go out and educate themselves to the point where they can (which isn't too hard in this case - just look up Wiegners function and phase space).

Science isn't like school where you just wait until a teacher feeds it to you with a spoon (and science journalism is certainly not such a teacher). Science is hard work - that you have to do yourself.

Did the author of this article even consider defining even one of his terms for a non-PhD audience?

Why should he? His paper is written for a grad student/PhD audience. It's not his job to put this in laymen's terms.

I guess I missed the part in school where the instructor told me I had to do research before I picked up a generally published article and read it rather than the actual paper. Just another day of nodding off.

Now I know why I never understand anything I read about economics, biology, medicine, philosophy, mathematics, chemistry, history, politics, agriculture, agronomy, herbology, wicca .......

Just didn't do the research first.

Just didn't do the research first.

That's just how it goes beyond a certain level. Science isn't kindergarten anymore.
At some point you have to take responsibility for your own education.

Most of all at the forefront of science there really isn't anyone who can tell you about this stuff, because it's brand new. So you have to just try and get to grips with it as best you can.

Some enjoy this activity - and those expand their horizon.
Others feel cheated because they somehow feel they should be entitled being handing the solution - and those get stuck at the level they're at.

Remember: The number of people who understand an new paper fully is intially one (the one writing it). And I really don't see why you would expect researchers to also be fabulous teachers (or interested in making people who will never use their work knowledegeable about it). Research is their job. They have enough on their plate doing that.