9 D Universe

A new LIDAR system can image objects in three dimensions underwater using a single-photon detector array. Developed by researchers at Herriot-Watt University in the UK, the technology could come in handy for applications such as inspecting, monitoring and surveying underwater objects, off-shore engineering, and even archaeology. “To the best of our [...]

On 10 October 2024, NASA plans to launch the Europa Clipper mission, which will study Jupiter’s moon Europa in a series of flybys. In anticipation of the launch, the US poet laureate Ada Limón has written an ode to the mission. Called “In praise of mystery: a poem for Europa”, the [...]

Fifty years ago, on June 1, 1973, astronomers around the world were introduced to a powerful and perplexing new phenomenon called GRBs (gamma-ray bursts). Today sensors on orbiting satellites like NASA's Swift and Fermi missions detect a GRB somewhere in the sky about once a day on average. Astronomers think [...]

There have been an increasing number of platform comparison studies in recent years, with most comparisons limited to single-centre studies. Study bias is common in the literature, due to various study flaws, including a comparison of non-contemporary equipment, unequal expertise and comparison of plans created in a clinical versus study [...]

This year marks 50 years since British rock bank Pink Floyd released their seminal album The Dark Side of the Moon. From my experience as a physics teacher, I can tell you that most teenagers today would struggle to name a single track on the album. But a majority of [...]

The first direct measurement has been made of a thorium-229 nuclear transition that could potentially form the basis for a “nuclear clock”. Done at CERN, the research follows a 2016 experiment that confirmed the transition’s existence but did not detect the resulting emitted photon. Much work remains before a working [...]

Author(s): Philip BallBy exploiting a phenomenon called stochastic resonance, sensors can perform better in a noisy environment than in a noise-free setting.[Physics 16, 94] Published Fri Jun 02, 2023 [...]

Author(s): Charles DayThe gravitational fields of black holes and other compact objects are strong enough to wrest pairs of particles and antiparticles out of the vacuum and into existence, causing the objects to decay.[Physics 16, s77] Published Fri Jun 02, 2023 [...]

It’s been a good couple of months for perovskite solar cells, with a trio of new results that could make it easier to commercialize these next-generation devices. The first result concerns perovskite-only solar photovoltaic (PV) cells. The initial promise of perovskite solar cells has long been impaired by the unstable nature [...]

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features an interview with Amanda Barnard, who began her career as a theoretical physicist and now leads a multidisciplinary research group that applies computational science across a wide range of fields including nanotechnology, materials science, chemistry, and medicine. Barnard is also deputy director, [...]

Author(s): Charles DayCitizen scientists combed through radio astronomy observations to identify new sources of transient emission that computer algorithms overlooked.[Physics 16, 93] Published Thu Jun 01, 2023 [...]

Author(s): Matteo RiniResearchers have synthesized a chalcogenide compound that has the electronic structure of an ideal Dirac semimetal—which could facilitate the study of this exotic class of materials.[Physics 16, s81] Published Thu Jun 01, 2023 [...]

Author(s): Michael SchirberExperiments show that the sticky behavior of so-called associative polymers is controlled by the density of bonding structures, contradicting theoretical predictions.[Physics 16, s80] Published Wed May 31, 2023 [...]

Astronomers discover the last three planets the Kepler telescope observed before going dark. More than 5,000 planets are confirmed to exist beyond our solar system. Over half were discovered by NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, a resilient observatory that far outlasted its original planned mission. Over nine and a half years, the [...]

More than 5,000 planets are confirmed to exist beyond our solar system. Over half were discovered by NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, a resilient observatory that far outlasted its original planned mission. Over nine and a half years, the spacecraft trailed the Earth, scanning the skies for periodic dips in starlight [...]

Undergraduate research helped feed physics and EECS major Thomas Bergamaschi’s post-MIT interest in tackling challenges. “Every time I try to solve a problem — whether it be physics or computer science — I always try to find an elegant solution,” says MIT senior Thomas Bergamaschi, who spent four years learning how [...]

Author(s): Charles DayAn unusual kind of superconductor harbors magnetic vortices that researchers predict should be readily observable thanks to the striped configurations they adopt.[Physics 16, s73] Published Tue May 30, 2023 [...]

Author(s): Margaret D. ReidA new demonstration involving hundreds of entangled atoms tests Schrödinger’s interpretation of Einstein, Rosen, and Podolsky’s classic thought experiment.[Physics 16, 92] Published Tue May 30, 2023 [...]

Vol. 6741. Letters to the Editor Vacuum polarization alters the spectra of accreting X-ray pulsars by E. Sokolova-Lapa, J. Stierhof, T. Dauser, and J. Wilms 2023, A&A, 674, L2 The X-ray spectrum of high mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) sometimes shows a feature around an energy of 10 keV. Absorption features in the [...]