What does everyday copper, high temperature superconductors, magic angle graphene, doped silicon semiconductors, and the quark gluon plasma have in common? All of them, in some regime, are controlled by a `Planckian’ transport timescale made up from fundamental constants and the temperature: t~/(kT). I will review recent and not-so-recent appearances of this timescale across physics, and will discuss whether the ubiquitous appearance of this timescale is a coincidence or potentially indicative of a deep principle in quantum statistical mechanics.

Professor Sean Hartnoll (Stanford)

 

https://bristol-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/95982115892