Physics
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Physics
How understanding nature made the atomic bomb inevitable
On the anniversary of Hiroshima, here’s a look back at the chain reaction of basic discoveries that led to nuclear weapons.
- Health & Medicine
Human sperm don’t swim the way that anyone had thought
High-speed 3-D microscopy and mathematical analyses reveal that rolling and lopsided tail flicks keep the cells swimming in a straight line.
- Physics
The physics of solar flares could help scientists predict imminent outbursts
Physicists aim to improve space weather predictions by studying the physical processes that spark a solar flare.
- Physics
A black hole circling a wormhole would emit weird gravitational waves
A new calculation reveals the strange gravitational waves LIGO and Virgo could see if a black hole were falling into a hypothetical tunnel in spacetime.
- Physics
A giant underground motion sensor in Germany tracks Earth’s wobbles
A giant underground gyroscope array has taken its first measurements of how the world goes ’round.
- Physics
The universe might have a fundamental clock that ticks very, very fast
A theoretical study could help physicists searching for a theory of quantum gravity.
- Physics
Physicists have ‘braided’ strange quasiparticles called anyons
All known particles fall into two classes. Physicists just found new evidence of a third class in 2-D materials.
- Particle Physics
This is the first known particle with four of the same kind of quark
A weird four-quark particle could be a unique testing ground for the strong force that governs how quarks stick together.
- Health & Medicine
Why scientists say wearing masks shouldn’t be controversial
New data suggest that cloth masks work to reduce coronavirus cases, though less well than medical masks.
- Space
Colliding black holes may have created a surprising flare of light
A flare-up after a gravitational wave outburst may be the first sighting of light from colliding black holes.
- Particle Physics
Physicists spot a new class of neutrinos from the sun
Researchers with the Borexino experiment in Italy have detected neutrinos produced in the secondary fusion process taking place in the sun’s core.
- Quantum Physics
To live up to the hype, quantum computers must repair their error problems
Before quantum computers can reach their potential, scientists will need to master quantum error correction.
