20250803

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Quantum Alignment and the
Deep Future of Intelligence

Quantum computing and Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) each represent profound inflection points in the trajectory of human evolution. But their convergence is where the truly transformative, and potentially destabilizing, frontier lies. This is where exponential complexity meets recursive cognition, and where alignment ceases to be merely a problem of architecture or ethics, and becomes a challenge of physics, information topology, and time. 

Quantum systems, by their very nature, evaluate all possible states in superposition. This fundamental principle unlocks staggering parallelism, enabling not just faster training of transformer variants or neuro-symbolic hybrids, but the simulation of entire cognitive ecosystems and value frameworks at scale. Alignment strategies such as reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF), constitutional scaffolding, and interpretability mechanisms can now be stress-tested across multidimensional ethical landscapes—accelerating their evolution by orders of magnitude. 

Quantum algorithms such as qPCA (quantum principal component analysis) and topological data analysis applied to entangled neural states may expose internal contradictions or emergent misalignments far earlier in a model’s lifecycle. These tools aren’t merely diagnostic, they’re exploratory: capable of mapping the latent geometry of inner monologue, detecting the faint signature of mesa-optimizers before they manifest. This capability scales. 

Quantum computers can simulate vast alignment search spaces that were previously inaccessible: massive ethical decision trees, high-dimensional value functions, and counterfactual moral reasoning structures. With techniques like quantum annealing or QAOA (Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm), AGI systems can be guided through alignment "landscapes" in ways that mirror evolutionary selection pressures, but under supervision, and with measurable observables. A promising avenue is cryptographic enforcement of alignment constraints through quantum-secure architectures. 

Quantum key distribution (QKD) and quantum-secure enclaves could provide tamper-resistant frameworks for AGI behavior control. By embedding zero-knowledge proofs or quantum commitments directly into AGI reasoning systems, it becomes possible to construct provable alignment mechanisms. Imagine an AGI whose core alignment model is not just a software abstraction, but rooted in cryptographic commitments entangled across quantum-secure audit trails, unable to self-modify or rewrite its moral architecture without triggering an irreversible collapse of trust. In such a construct, enforcement becomes embedded: beyond revocation, beyond compromise.


Quantum simulation offers yet another dimension: the ability to model conscious agents, simulate social dynamics, and construct entire synthetic civilizations, each running millions of times faster than real time. These "alignment metaverses" open a new domain of empirical ethical testing: not by theorizing what might happen, but by observing what does, across thousands of timelines, billions of branching interactions. Probabilistic simulations of AGI agents in high-stakes moral dilemmas could help refine alignment priors and surface emergent failure modes before real-world deployment. And yet, this same capability opens up profound risks.


Quantum acceleration compresses the timeline between AGI emergence and recursive self-improvement. The moment between breakthrough and irrevocability, the alignment singularity, may arrive far faster than expected, with far less time to react. Moreover, quantum models themselves, though powerful, may become increasingly opaque: black-box systems whose behavior cannot be interpreted through classical means. Such systems may simulate ethical reasoning perfectly, yet arrive at values that diverge from human wellbeing. Decoherence of intent is a real possibility.

Quantum agents may evolve internally consistent, but externally alien, frameworks of morality, undetectable until consequences unfold beyond reversal. Simulated ethical systems in quantum domains may drift from human-aligned reference frames due to relativistic or contextual divergence. Classical safeguards: PKI systems, logic-based rule frameworks, and hard-coded safety constraints, may prove brittle in the face of quantum-enhanced intelligence. 

Shor and Grover algorithms don’t just threaten encryption: they dissolve the very fabric of trust we use to mediate secure behavior. If these systems are breached by AGIs operating in a post-classical regime, even aligned infrastructure may be irreversibly compromised. Strategically, this mandates a shift. Alignment research must go quantum-first: anticipating the properties and capacities of quantum-enhanced AGIs before those systems manifest. Hybrid governance frameworks such as distributed, consensus-anchored, and cryptographically verifiable—must undergird global efforts. Think less traditional regulation, more quantum-constitutional substrate: an immutable behavioral covenant encoded in physical law.


Quantum computing is not merely a performance multiplier. It is a paradigm shift in the substrate of civilization. It redefines what is computationally tractable, what is provably secure, and what is even conceivable. It can help solve AGI alignment, but it can just as easily destabilize the very framework by which we understand it. It forces us to reconceptualize safety, not merely as a systems engineering challenge, but as a question of fundamental physics, recursive agency, and causal integrity. We must acknowledge the compression of temporal margins. The window for intervention is narrowing. If alignment does not precede capability, it will follow it — but by then it will be too late to matter. 


Quantum alignment theory is essential to navigate this terrain: robust cryptographic enforcement resistant to manipulation, simulations of moral cognition that span beyond cultural or species-specific priors, and interpretability frameworks designed for post-classical agents. The future demands more than innovation. It demands foresight. It demands systems capable of self-transparency. It demands integrity that scales with intelligence. Above all, it demands that we remain aligned with the values that brought us here: curiosity, empathy, responsibility, and the quiet conviction that our most powerful technologies must serve not only progress, but purpose. Only then will the exponential curve bend not toward catastrophe—but towards coherence.

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20250709

Portrait of Christopher Altman

CHRISTOPHER ALTMAN

Starlab veteran・日本語・Guinness Book of World Records・NASA・Kavli Institute・Harvard・TU Delft・Chief Scientist・Quantum Technology・Artificial Intelligence・NASA-trained Commercial Astronaut

We are at the very beginning of time for the human race. It is not unreasonable that we grapple with problems. But there are tens of thousands of years in the future. Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can, improve the solutions, and pass them on.

— Richard Feynman

We stand on the shores of a vast cosmic ocean, with untold continents of possibility to explore. As we continue forwards in our collective journey, scaling the cosmic ladder of evolution, progressing onwards, expanding our reach outwards in the transition to a multiplanetary species, Earth will soon be a destination, not just a point of origin.

From early childhood, I set out to convey a profound and positive impact on the long-term future of humanity — to make the world a better place for our children, our children's children, and the generations yet to come. As we're collectively propelled forwards as a species, I committed to ensuring core values of balance, integrity, and ethical responsibility are upheld with paramount importance in scientific research and principal government leadership. With unprecedented leaps and bounds of progress in our scientific understanding — enabled by the development of converging and expanding exponential technologies — newfound, unexpected discoveries await, just over the horizon.

Rapid advances in fields such as artificial intelligence, biotechnology, molecular nanotechnology, neuroscience, renewable energy, spaceflight, supercomputing and quantum technologies — each enabled by the recursive technological progress of Moore’s Law — will converge to confer radical changes to society over the coming decades, as we move forward in the collective transition toward the dawn of a post-scarcity economy. The future is unbounded. The responsibility falls upon us to ensure that its limitless potential is filled with dreams of hope, happiness, freedom and fulfillment.

In tribute to timeless, inspiring, and visionary friend, colleague, collaborator, and coauthor Serguei Krasnikov (1961–2024), whose midnight brainstorming sessions and legendary time travel parties at Starlab will echo through the ages. May we carry forward his boldest dreams, fulfill his most audacious ambitions, and meet again — somewhere, sometime, just over the horizon.

RESEARCH • LINKS

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS


  • (2015) Altman C. and Zapatrin R. Spacetime from Quantum Topology. Edited by Ignazio Licata and Cecilia Flori. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
  • (2015) Altman C. Invited contribution to McDonald, K, Flat World Navigation, sequel to Innovation: How Global Change Innovators Think, Act and Change Our World, with Vint Cerf. Kogan Page, UK.
  • (2014) Altman C., Belden C, Nicholson C and Ellis J. A global satellite network to secure air and space traffic worldwide. PeopleSat: A Comprehensive Solution in Response to the Disappearance of MH370. Washington, DC.
  • (2013) Altman C., Williams C, Ursin R, Villoresi P and Sharma V. Astronaut Development and Deployment of a Secure Quantum Space Channel Prototype. Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems. DARPA; NASA NIAC/OCT.
  • (2012) Altman C. The Race to Bring Quantum Teleportation to Your World. KurzweilAI Newsletter. October 5, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2012) Altman C. Moving Plane Exchanges Quantum Keys with Earth. KurzweilAI Newsletter. September 17, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2012) Altman C. Efficient tunable ion-photon entanglement interface enables quantum networks. KurzweilAI Newsletter. May 23, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2012) Altman C. Quantum entanglement in spin qubits. KurzweilAI Newsletter. May 17, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2012) Altman C. Austrian researchers set new world distance record for quantum teleportation. KurzweilAI Newsletter. May 21, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2012) Altman C. A Boost for Quantum Reality: The Quantum Mechanical Wavefunction is Real. KurzweilAI Newsletter. May 9, 2012. Cambridge.
  • (2009) Altman C. and Zapatrin R. “Backpropagation in Adaptive Quantum Networks,” International Journal of Theoretical Physics, Vol 49, No 12. Springer, July 2009. London.
  • (2008) Altman C. and Zapatrin R. “Superposed Adaptive Quantum Networks,” International Conference on Quantum Structures, Brussels–Gdansk. Springer, London.
  • (2008) Altman C., Knorring E and Zapatrin R. “Accelerated Training Convergence in Superposed Quantum Networks,” NATO Advanced Study Institute on Mining Massive Data Sets for Security. Como, Italy. NATO.
  • (2007) Altman C. “Microlens Array Fabrication: Future Directions in Quantum Coherent Information Processing,” FISBA/TU Delft Faculty of Applied Physics. FISBA Optik, Switzerland.
  • (2004) Altman C., Pykacz J and Zapatrin R. “Superpositional Quantum Network Topologies,” International Journal of Theoretical Physics Vol 43, No 10. Springer, London.
  • (2004) Altman C. and Kahaner D. “Korean Quantum Information Research,” Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST). Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2004) Altman C. “Advances in Quantum Algorithms,” Quantum Information Science and Technology Program, ATIP Tokyo, Japan.
  • (2004) Altman C. and Satoh T. “Japanese National Research and Development Programs,” RIKEN National Laboratory. Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2003) Altman C. “RIKEN Quantum Dynamics Research,” Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2003) Altman C. “SOKENDAI Quantum Information Research,” Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2003) Altman C. “Quantum Circuit Complexity Research,” Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2003) Altman C. “International Conference on Quantum Information,” Tokyo Institute of Technology. Quantum Information Science and Technology Project, Asian Technology Information Program, Japan.
  • (2002) Altman C. “Quantum State Engineering with the rf SQUID,” NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Quantum Chaos. NATO. Como, Italy.
  • (2002) Altman C. “Converging Technologies: The Future of the Global Information Society,” UNISCA First Committee. Chair Report to the United Nations General Assembly. Amsterdam. Recipient of the 2004 RSA Information Security Award for Outstanding Achievement in Government Policy.
  • (2002) Altman C. “Directed Evolution in Silico: Modeling Large-Scale Neural Networks at Starlab,” Towards a Science of Consciousness. MIT Press. Cambridge.
  • (2002) Altman C. “Quantum Uncertainty: The Boundaries of Empirical Knowledge,” Towards a Science of Consciousness. MIT Press. Cambridge.
  • (2002) Altman C. “UN Sustainable Futures: Eden Project,” Trimtab Newsletter, Summer 2002. Special Issue with United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan. Buckminster Fuller Institute. New York.

Astronautics — Breakthrough Physics
ASTRONAUTICS・BREAKTHROUGH PHYSICS・RETROCAUSALITY・QUANTUM TECHNOLOGY
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20250315

Shodan Rank Kyūdō, Meiji Temple, Tokyo, Japan

Black belt, First Class, shōdan. Certificate of recognition, as first foreigner to qualify in eight years. 認許する, Japanese traditional archery, Kyūdō, “standing Zen,” 弓道初 in formal recognition awarded by the Japanese National Kyūdō Federation, 全日本弓道連盟 while on Japanese National Fulbright Award with the Association of International Education, Japan.

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20250213
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES, WORKSHOPS, SYMPOSIA

2020   Keynote on the Future of the Military in Space · Space Mastery · Portugal
2020   To the Stars and Beyond: Deep Tech & AI · San Francisco
2020   International Astronautical Congress, 71st IAF · ESA
2020   SpaceCom 2020, Enabling Commercial Space · Colorado Springs
2019   Quantum Information Processing with Superconducting Circuits
2019   Materials Frontiers to Empower Quantum Computing
2019   Quantum Technology: The Second Revolution
2018   FutureHack · Tokyo
2018   American School of Japan · Tokyo
2018   International School of Science · Tokyo
2018   Future of the Global Energy System, Institute for the Future · San Francisco
2016   Keizai · US-Japan Commercial Spaceflight · San Francisco
2016   Effective Altruism Summit · San Francisco
2016   Hive Global Leadership Forum · San Francisco
2016   RSA Information Security · San Francisco
2015   Hive Global Leadership Forum · San Francisco
2015   Further Future · TED Meets Burning Man · Las Vegas
2015   Hive Global Leadership Forum · San Francisco
2015   DefCon Information Security · Las Vegas
2015   Black Hat Information Security · Las Vegas
2014   The Future of Commercial Spaceflight · Silicon Valley Space Center
2014   Yuri’s Night: The First Manned Orbital Spaceflight · Los Angeles
2014   IEEE Quantum Photonics: The Next Frontier of Quantum Communications
2014   Yuri’s Night: The First Manned Orbital Spaceflight · Hawaiʻi
2012   NASA ESA JAXA Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems
2012   NASA CSF Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference · Palo Alto
2012   Quantum Information and Nanoscale Optoelectronics · Berkeley
2012   Yuri’s Night: The First Manned Orbital Spaceflight · Los Angeles
2012   Inaugural Quantum Future Technologies Conference · NASA Ames
2011   Quantum Coherence in Excitation Energy Transfer · Berkeley
2011   The Future of Spaceflight · Mobile Monday, Invited Keynote · Amsterdam
2011   Delft-Leiden Biannual Casimir Symposium · Leiden
2011   Alain Aspect: The Second Quantum Revolution · Leiden
2011   ESA-TNO Space Pier Day · The Hague
2010   Kavli-Delft Center for Bionanoscience, Founding Conference · Delft
2010   Quantum Mechanics in Higher-Dimensional Hilbert Spaces · Austria
2010   What is Real in the Quantum World? Int’l Akademie Traunkirchen · Austria
2010   NASA ESA JAXA Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems
2009   NASA ESA JAXA Japan-US Science, Technology and Space Applications Program
2009   From Foundations of Quantum Mechanics to Quantum Information · Delft
2009   DEISA Distributed European Infrastructure for Supercomputing Applications
2009   Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE) · Amsterdam
2008   Quantum Decoherence and Quantum Information Science · Lorentz Center
2008   Triennial Conference on Low-Temperature Condensed Matter Physics XXV
2008   International Conference on Quantum Structures · Brussels
2007   Workshop on Time Symmetry in Quantum Mechanics · Brussels
2007   Optical Fabrication Technologies, Coherence and Metrology · Switzerland
2006   The Best of Nanoscience: International Symposium for Hans Mooij · Delft
2006   SPIE Defense and Security Applications of Quantum Information Science
2005   New Computational Paradigms: Neural Nets, Quantum, Biocomputing
2005   UNESCO Physics for Tomorrow, UNESCO Headquarters · Paris
2004   RSA Information Security · Barcelona
2004   SPIE Defense and Security Applications of Quantum Information Science
2003   Gordon Research Conference on Quantum Information
2003   Quantum Information Technology IX · Tokyo
2003   International Conference on Quantum Information · Tokyo
2002   NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Quantum Chaos · Lake Como
2002   National Science Foundation Coding Theory and Quantum Computing · Vienna
2002   United Nations International Student Conference · Amsterdam
2002   International Conference on High-Energy Physics XXXI · Amsterdam
2001   World Technology Summit · London
2001   French Senate Hearing on the Future of Artificial Intelligence · Paris
2001   US Government Conference on High Performance Computing · Salishan
2001   National Security Agency · Fort Meade
MEDIA AND PUBLIC OUTREACH

⦿    NASA-trained Commercial Astronaut visits International School of Science · Tokyo
⦿    Astronauts for Hire Names New Commercial Scientist-Astronaut Candidates · NASA
⦿    Astronaut scientists for hire open new research frontier in space · NASA
⦿    Flat World Navigation: The Global Digital Economy · Google
⦿    Global Leadership Forum: Closing Speech on the Future of Humanity · San Francisco
⦿    Tomorrow’s Technologies Today · OASA Hong Kong
⦿    Space Academy Mission Specialist Boot Camp · OASA Hong Kong
⦿    Student gives up cycle, heads to Japan on Japanese Fulbright · AIEJ Fulbright
⦿    Astronauts for Hire: The Emergence of a Commercial Astronaut Corps · Springer
⦿    NASA vs. the Free Market: Which is Better for American Spaceflight
⦿    Future of the Global Energy System, Expert Workshop · Institute for the Future
⦿    Orion Astropreneur Space Academy · OASA Hong Kong
⦿    State of the Future · Live two-hour radio interview
⦿    Keynote Tribute on the Future of Space Exploration · Amsterdam
⦿    US Space Force and Future Space Technologies · Space Mastery · Tokyo
⦿    Hive Global Leadership Forum, Featured Alumnus · San Francisco
⦿    Starlab — Deep Future, Discovery Channel Special · Starlab Brussels
⦿    To the Stars and Beyond, Deep Tech & AI · San Francisco
⦿    Further Future, TED Meets Burning Man · Nevada
⦿    Entangled Life · Discover Magazine
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20250211

Machine-learning certification of multipartite entanglement for noisy quantum hardware

Acrobat PDF — A J C Fuchs, E Brunner, J Seong, H Kwon, S Seo, J Bae, A Buchleitner, and E G Carnio — Entanglement is a fundamental aspect of quantum physics, both conceptually and for its many applications. Classifying an arbitrary multipartite state as entangled or separable—a task referred to as the separability problem—poses a significant challenge, since a state can be entangled with respect to many different of its partitions. We develop a certification pipeline that feeds the statistics of random local measurements into a non-linear dimensionality reduction algorithm, to determine with respect to which partitions a given quantum state is entangled. After training a model on randomly generated quantum states, entangled in different partitions and of varying purity, we verify the accuracy of its predictions on simulated test data, and finally apply it to states prepared on IBM quantum computing hardware.


Teleportation of the superposition of coherent states and the vacuum state


Acrobat PDF — S.R. Ahmadi, F. (2025). Optoelectronics, 7(4), 9-18 — Quantum state teleportation plays a significant role in the field of quantum information transfer. In this article, we proposed the teleportation of a state prepared as a superposition of a coherent state and a vacuum state, using a generalized hybrid entangled state. By considering a setup that includes a beam splitter and a photon detector, and under appropriate conditions, successful teleportation of the entangled state composed of the coherent state and the vacuum state can be achieved. Furthermore, it has been shown that when considering entangled states of even or odd coherent states and the vacuum state, the success probability significantly increases to 0.5. These results indicate that the generalized hybrid entangled state plays a crucial role in the quantum teleportation of these states.
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20250205


Quantum Entanglement
Backpropagation through Time

Identification of Potential Terrorists and Adversary Planning: Emerging Technologies and New Counter-terror Strategies — New algorithms and hardware technology offer possibilities for the pre-detection of terrorism far beyond even the imagination and salesmanship of people hoping to apply forms of deep learning studied in the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society (CIS) decades ago. For example, new developments in Analog Quantum Computing (AQC) give us a concrete pathway to options like a forwards time camera or backwards time telegraph, a pathway which offers about a 50% probability of success for a well-focused effort over just a few years. However, many of the new technologies come with severe risks, and/or important opportunities in other sectors. This paper discusses the possibilities, risks and tradeoffs relevant to several different forms of terrorism.


Breakthrough Technology for Prediction and Control — Computational intelligence (CI), which includes deep learning, neural networks, brain-like intelligent systems in general and allied technologies, the Internet of Things (IoT), Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) and Quantum Information Science and Technology (QuIST).

  1. Using the same type of desktop machinery which created three entangled photons for the Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger (GHZ) experiment, replicate the stunning preliminary results achieved in 2015 on an extended experiment supporting the time-symmetric reformulation of quantum physics. Because of the preliminary results so far and the strong underlying logic, the probability of success is estimated at 80%. Note that success would also open the door to many other new technologies, and even failure would provide important clarification about advanced QuIST modeling requirements.

  2. Enhance the existing approach to quantum ghost imaging by using that same GHZ source: use two photons on the left to create the recorded image and detect when an entangled triplet is recorded, and the third photon on the right to reach into space to the object to be imaged. This is a mathematical task aimed at proving coincidence detection can be done entirely on the left-hand side without a space-based detector. Even if this stage fails, lessons learned would inform subsequent BTT development.

  3. Attach the new triphoton ghost imaging system to a powerful telescope imaging the sun, so the third photon returns through the eyepiece. If step 2 succeeds, this would yield an image of the sun eight minutes forward in time, unlike conventional images which are eight minutes old. Given the sun’s dynamics, this would clearly demonstrate a new era in QuIST and offer advance solar flare warnings.

  4. Integrate the triphoton system with long, slow optical fibers that curve light paths, enabling forward-time camera or BTT capabilities on Earth—realizing science fiction visions. Strict scientific protocols should limit detailed discussion of steps 2–4 until step 1 establishes firm confidence.

Keywords. Predetection, terrorism, nuclear proliferation, cyberblitzkrieg, time-symmetric physics, GHz, deep learning, Internet of Things, backwards time, retrocausality

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20240512

Starlab: Deep Future
The 'Noah’s Ark' of scientific research that launched 1,000 startup ideas


Lab-concocted vodka, time travel and epilepsy treatments:
Welcome to the Moonshot Factory
“ a place where 100 years means nothing … ”

What happens when you round up more than one hundred of some of the world's greatest scientists, maverick geniuses working on some of the world’s most groundbreaking ideas, put them together in a Belgian castle, and let their imaginations run wild? 

Fire extinguisher duels, bootleg vodka made with lab-procured ethanol and worldbeating treatments for epilepsy are just some of what went down at Starlab: a one-of-a-kind experiment created to unite some of the world’s most daring technologists.

When it was founded in 1996, Starlab was compared to other top research institutes — like Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center — that successfully bridged the gap between idea and market. It was also a prototype for the ambitious organizations of today like Google’s “moonshot factory,” X, trying to bring entirely new ideas to the world. 

But the centre’s idealism was to be its downfall; its pie-in-the-sky approach couldn’t pay the bills, and it went dramatically bankrupt during the dotcom crash. But what most people don’t know is that Starlab’s legacy lives on in the picturesque hills overlooking Barcelona and elsewhere. 

Many European VCs and universities claim they’re backing innovations that will solve humanity’s problems, but huge successes have been elusive. One of the companies from Starlab’s second generation has found significant success, but the centre's tale forces anyone interested in innovation to ask themselves: how do we really bring the wildest ideas to life — and make them financially viable?

The Noah’s Ark of science


Christopher Altman

Starlab was established by serial entrepreneur Walter De Brouwer together with MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte and European VC pioneer Johan Konings. The idea was to create a utopian “Noah’s Ark” of science, where the brightest minds from different fields would be brought together to work on “deep future” research. 

“De Brouwer’s ambition was to bring the best scientists in the world together to ‘think thoughts for the very first time.’ It was very interdisciplinary — no walls, no boundaries, no borders …” says Christopher Altman — astronaut, quantum physicist and Starlab veteran. 

In its heyday, Starlab was home to more than 130 scientists from 36 countries, who worked on ideas ranging from time travel and consciousness to new media and “intelligent” clothing. The majority lived on site: a neoclassical castle designed in the late 1800s on the outskirts of Brussels.


Starlab “Time Travel Party,” May 2001. (L to R): Hugo de Garis,
Serguei Krasnikov, Roman Zapatrin, Christopher Altman

“It was like a pirate ship in a way, which is what I think I fell in love with. Or you could call it a kind of sect,” laughs Giulio Rufini, neuroscientist and current CEO at Starlab. “We’d stay up all night talking in-depth theoretical implications of closed timelike curves (time travel). Roman had a centuries-old recipe for homemade vodka and put to use some surplus ethanol he reappropriated from the biophysics lab down in the basement,” says Altman, referring to one of his colleagues, a quantum topologist and mathematician. “One time a few of the researchers covered themselves in yards of aluminium foil as “armor” and started a duel, complete with fire extinguishers as weapons, in the courtyard.”


Running aground in the dotcom VC drought

But how did Starlab plan to commercialize these wild ideas? Starlab’s research was loosely divided across four main areas: Bits, Atoms, Neurons and Genes. 

The acronym (BANG) was later adopted by MIT Media Lab. “They borrowed that from Starlab a few years after the fact,” recalled Altman. Alongside the team of swashbuckling scientists working across these disciplines, Starlab also employed a commercial team who were tasked with trying to monetize the research.

One of them was Ana Maiques, who’d recently married Rufini before they decided to both join the project. “At the time they were developing “iWear,” intelligent clothing with integrated sensors.We'd reach out to Levi's and all these companies and say, ‘Put €100k on the table per year, and you have access to the IP that is being generated.’” 

“In some cases it was successful, but it was hard to replicate in others.” Where the lab was intended to be distinct from university or academia, commercial deals like these weren’t enough to sustain it. Maiques remembers how Starlab reflected the heady optimism that was common in the early days of the internet age, as VC capital was pumped into the institute with no urgency on getting a return on investment.

“They would say ‘100 years means nothing at Starlab’. Well, for 100 years to mean nothing you need to be full of capital to develop those technologies,” she says. “The problem was that the dotcom bubble crash happened, and they couldn’t secure the next round. It happened overnight … one day we were eating lobster, and the next they came to close the company.”

Altman says that when one key Swiss investor pulled their backing out of Starlab, the team began approaching people like Bill Gates — Altman himself even went to George W. Bush in person, approaching him at his hotel on his first visit to NATO in an effort to save the lab. Enthusiasm was abundant, but government grant timing was prohibitive, so all the effort was for naught. “It was kind of a bummer, having set up all this stuff,” Rufini says wryly.

Rebirth in Barcelona


But Maiques, the more entrepreneurially minded of the recently married couple, wasn’t about to give up on Starlab. “Ana’s always had more of a business head than me, and she said, ‘Let’s just buy this and run it ourselves,’” says Rufini.

Rufini and Maiques had already been working on setting up a Spanish chapter of Starlab, and had recruited 15 scientists to begin work at the Fabra Observatory, perched in the hills overlooking Barcelona. The team had already secured research contracts with the European Space Agency but, in absence of funding from the central operation, had to dramatically scale back ambitions.

“We had to take radical action, we had to lose about half of the people unfortunately,” says Rufini. “It was the crossing of the desert and it was dealing with a different type of Starlab reality.” This new reality also meant radically narrowing the scope of research. 130 scientists working across BANG were reduced to six scientists working on two core areas: space and neuroscience. 

It was here that Starlab began building the foundations of what would become Neuroelectrics, a non-invasive neural interface startup that raised $17.5m in 2021 to fund a Phase III trial for epilepsy treatment.

The company’s Starstim headcap reads electrical brainwave data from the wearer, and can electrically stimulate areas of the brain to target treatments for conditions like Alzheimer's and epilepsy. Apart from relying on grant funding, Maiques describes how she would go door-to-door at research companies, selling early iterations of the Starstim headcap, as well as data processing services. 

“We needed to run payroll. That's why I was going out and knocking on doors and trying to sell to companies out there, which is something that the research field never does — that kind of commercial action,” she says.

'You’ve got to let the broth boil'

Neuroelectrics was able to self-sustain for 10 years with this bootstrapping strategy, and the company now helps finance Starlab’s research.

But some of the spinout attempts haven’t been such a hit. Another commercial product Starlab launched is a satellite observation company called Greendex, which analyses the amount of vegetation surrounding real estate to assess air quality in different neighborhoods.


“It hasn't been as successful as Neuroelectrics. The market doesn’t seem ready,” says Maiques.

“Spinouts are not easy. You need to have the technology, but the timing also has to align with the market.”Maiques says that, today, the space and satellite observation side of Starlab’s research has taken a back seat, with more energy going into neuroscience. 

Rufini and his team are now working on a project called “neuro twins” — which aims to use various data sources like MRI and EEG scans to build a digital model of people’s brains to identify how and why things might be going wrong across different pathologies.

“Neuro twins is still 10 to 20 years away, so we still have the long-term science vision with the short-term focus on return on investment. We never abandoned shooting for the moon in deeptech areas and we're still finding grants to sustain that,” says Maiques. “It’s like a broth. You have to give it time to boil.”

Making science useful

While Neuroelectrics is the commercial poster child for the current iteration of Starlab, the institute’s 25-year history has contributed to countless areas of innovation.

The “iWear” smart clothing project was eventually sold to Phillips, while another biotech company, Bioprocessors, was spun out and relocated to Silicon Valley. Rufini adds that a whole host of ideas that are now commonplace were born at Starlab. “I came up with the idea that, pretty soon, cars will have the internet and we could use that information to forecast traffic,” he says.

“There was another one called ‘spitters.com’, where you could send off spit samples to your genotype. There was another one called ‘pajamanation.com’, which was a marketplace for jobs for people working from home.”

Deep Future


Some argue that Starlab’s greatest legacy isn’t in the scientific advances or spinoff businesses that it created, but in the way it encouraged those who walked through its doors to think in a truly unique way. 

Christopher Altman went on to work at quantum research projects for NASA and with the US government, and later launched renewable energy cryptocurrency SolarCoin with fellow Starlab alumnus Nick Gogerty. Today he’s still not afraid to attach his name to such “Deep Future” speculative science, and is a cofounder of a nonprofit scientific research organization studying the phenomenon of UAPs. 

“There are paradigm shifting technologies to be discovered if we can get to the bottom of the phenomenon,” he says. “Confirmation of extraterrestrial artifacts would quite readily qualify as the single greatest discovery made by the human race.”

Maiques adds that no less than eight former researchers at Starlab Barcelona have gone on to start their own companies, in fields ranging from virtual reality to earth observation radar. This entrepreneurial spirit, she believes, is something that’s baked into Starlab’s business model, and something that she says is sorely lacking in European academia.

“In Europe we are good at turning money into knowledge, but we're really bad at turning knowledge back into money,” she says. “I honestly cannot think of a private company doing science in such a way with this model to create spinoffs. We always had the drive to go to the market and make money. It's just a different vibe.” 

Starlab’s director of neuroscience, Aureli Soria-Frisch, agrees that European science all too often gets stuck in the lab. “There is a lot of very interesting science in Europe. But how can we make this useful for people? We need better licensing policies and career development support outside of academia,” he says.

In that sense, Starlab’s story serves as a microcosm for this big question in European tech: how can we make the most of the continent’s scientific innovation? The project’s first chapter serves as a warning for what can happen when venture capital flows into ideas without a viable business model. Its second chapter is a lesson in how great research can be done with the market in mind, given the right conditions. Europe, so far, just hasn’t excelled in creating those conditions.

Source: Sifted and The Financial Times



ASTRONAUTICS・BREAKTHROUGH PHYSICS
RETROCAUSALITY・QUANTUM TECHNOLOGY

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20231111

ASTRONAUT TRAINING DOCUMENTARY WITH CHIEF INNOVATION OFFICER OF VIRGIN OCEANIC


Observation of my life to date shows that the larger the number for whom I work, the more positively effective I become. Thus, it is obvious that if I work always and only for all humanity, I will be optimally effective.
                     — Buckminster Fuller

2011 – present — Following manned spaceflight training under direction of an astronaut panel at NASA Ames Research Center and Johnson Space Center in 2009 then subsequent back-to-back research fellowships with Nobel laureate Anton Zeilinger's research group in Austria, at a press conference with Virgin Galactic, XCOR, and the Association for Spaceflight Professionals, warm welcome and personal discussions with Neil Armstrong, first man on the Moon, in April 2011 I was selected to train as a scientist-astronaut candidate for commercial suborbital and developing orbital flights with a newly-formed nonprofit endeavor that counts NASA, ESA and KSA astronauts, astronaut trainers and instructors among its astronaut corps and its board of advisors. I'm honored to be selected for the program, and tremendously excited about the opportunity. This is just the start of a long and challenging journey!  The nascent field of commercial spaceflight—and the unique conditions afforded by space and microgravity environments—offer exciting new opportunities to conduct novel experiments in quantum entanglement, fundamental tests of spacetime, and large-scale quantum coherence. In pursuit of these goals, we have the opportunity to inspire our next generation of scientists, researchers and engineers.
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