Photosynthesis hits 99% energy transfer efficiency — way beyond anything we've built. For years the textbook said it was random molecular hopping, but that model leaks energy like crazy.
2007: Berkeley team uses ultrafast 2D electronic spectroscopy on the FMO complex (green sulfur bacteria). They catch quantum beating — excitation exists in superposition across multiple molecules for 660 femtoseconds at 77K. The energy doesn't pick one path, it samples all of them simultaneously like a quantum search algorithm. This basically birthed quantum biology as a field.
Obvious problem: coherence at cryogenic temps means nothing for biology. So 2010 follow-ups show it survives at 277K for 300 femtoseconds, even at room temp in algae. Looked like evolution hacked a quantum computer into leaves.
Then 2017 hits: Duan & Miller's group re-runs the experiment with better spectroscopy. Electronic coherence actually dies in 60 femtoseconds — way too fast to matter. Those long-lived oscillations everyone measured? Turns out they're mostly vibrational modes — the protein scaffold physically shaking, not electronic superposition.
2020: Field's own pioneers publish a mea culpa. The signals are vibrational, not electronic quantum effects doing the heavy lifting.
So plants don't run quantum algorithms — but the protein architecture still does something insanely efficient we don't fully understand. The answer got less exotic but arguably weirder: classical vibrations optimized by evolution to near-perfect energy routing.
2007: Berkeley team uses ultrafast 2D electronic spectroscopy on the FMO complex (green sulfur bacteria). They catch quantum beating — excitation exists in superposition across multiple molecules for 660 femtoseconds at 77K. The energy doesn't pick one path, it samples all of them simultaneously like a quantum search algorithm. This basically birthed quantum biology as a field.
Obvious problem: coherence at cryogenic temps means nothing for biology. So 2010 follow-ups show it survives at 277K for 300 femtoseconds, even at room temp in algae. Looked like evolution hacked a quantum computer into leaves.
Then 2017 hits: Duan & Miller's group re-runs the experiment with better spectroscopy. Electronic coherence actually dies in 60 femtoseconds — way too fast to matter. Those long-lived oscillations everyone measured? Turns out they're mostly vibrational modes — the protein scaffold physically shaking, not electronic superposition.
2020: Field's own pioneers publish a mea culpa. The signals are vibrational, not electronic quantum effects doing the heavy lifting.
So plants don't run quantum algorithms — but the protein architecture still does something insanely efficient we don't fully understand. The answer got less exotic but arguably weirder: classical vibrations optimized by evolution to near-perfect energy routing.