Add to Calendar 2026-10-27T16:00:00 2026-10-27T17:00:00 Pioneers in Theoretical Physics: Blast Freezing a Black Hole Event Information: We welcome you to our Pioneers in Theoretical Physics Colloqium Series, starting up again for this Fall, 2026.  On October 27th, we present Xiaoliang Qi, from Stanford University. Xioaling is a Chinese physicist and professor at Stanford University who studies quantum entanglement, quantum gravity, quantum chaos, and topological phenomena in condensed matter. Title: "Blast Freezing a Black Hole" Abstract: What happens to the information carried by a particle that falls into an evaporating black hole? This question brings together gravity, quantum mechanics, and the physics of interacting many-body systems. In this talk, I will explore it using a solvable model built from coupled Sachdev–Ye–Kitaev systems—quantum systems whose collective behavior provides a window into black-hole physics. By coupling an initially two-sided black hole to a larger, colder environment, we drive a rapid evaporation process that we call “blast freezing.” The model allows us to follow both the changing black-hole geometry and the fate of infalling information. I will explain how spacetime geometry can be reconstructed from quantum correlations, and how we can track information as it spreads among the system’s many degrees of freedom. This provides a concrete setting for exploring the interplay between quantum information and spacetime during black-hole evaporation. Bio: My current research interest is the interplay of quantum entanglement, quantum gravity and quantum chaos. The characterization of quantum information and quantum entanglement has provided novel understanding to space-time geometry, and relate the dynamics of chaotic many-body systems to the dynamics of space-time, i.e. quantum gravity theory. Based on recent progress in holographic duality (also known as AdS/CFT), my goal is to use tools such as tensor networks and solvable models to provide more microscopic understanding to the emergent space-time geometry from quantum states and quantum dynamics.  I am also interested in topological states and topological phenomena in condensed matter systems.   Learn More: Read his Stanford faculty profile here: https://profiles.stanford.edu/xiaoliang-qi  Watch his online talks:  http://online.kitp.ucsb.edu/online/chord18/opgrowth/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__9VBaLfC6Y&t=42s http://online.kitp.ucsb.edu/online/qinfo_c17/qi/      Event Location: HENN 318