Twenty stories make the finals of the Quantum Shorts contest

We are delighted to announce the shortlists for the Quantum Shorts 2015 flash fiction competition! The contest is organised by CQT with media partners Scientific American, Nature, Tor and Tor.com and other quantum centres ARC EQuS, IQC, IQIM and JQI as scientific partners.

The contest called for quantum-inspired stories up to 1000 words long. From the more than 400 entries received this year, the shortlists present a top ten in each of the Open and Youth categories. Visit the competition site at shorts2015.quantumlah.org to read the selection, drawing on quantum themes ranging from uncertainty principle to the multiverse.

The contest's eminent judges are now deliberating the awards. The judges include CQT's Director Artur Ekert, Scientific American Editor in Chief Mariette DiChristina and the editor of Futures, Nature's own science-themed fiction strand, Colin Sullivan. There is also a public poll open until 19 January 2016 to decide the winner of the $1000 People's Choice prize.

The shortlists were chosen by a panel of physicists, writers and representatives of the scientific partners. One panel member said they sorted stories with one column reserved for amazing ones - then had to start adding exclamation marks, ending up with a "super amazing" list and a "ridiculously amazing" list, the latter earning double exclamation marks!!  We hope you’ll be similarly impressed.