Physics & Math, features and articles | Educational Science

Apr 19, 2023

Oppenheimer: Everything we know about the atomic bomb creator's epic new biopic

This summer, renowned filmmaker Christopher Nolan returns to the big screen with Oppenheimer, his second movie based on real wartime events — the first was Dunkirk (2017). This time around, however, he's not taking us to the frontlines of World War II, but instead dealing with the complicated process behind...

Apr 30, 2023

Why do magnets have north and south poles?

Cutting a bar magnet in half won't get rid of its poles. It'll just produce two magnets, each with a north pole that will be attracted to the other magnet's south pole, and vice versa. It's this fundamental property of attraction that makes magnets useful for so many purposes, from...

Jun 10, 2023

Stephen Hawking wanted scientists to 'make black holes' on Earth. Physics says it's possible.

I hope you'll make black holes, Stephen said with a broad smile. We exited the cargo lift that had taken us underground into the five-story cavern housing the ATLAS experiment at the CERN lab, the legendary European Organization for Nuclear Research near Geneva. CERN's director general, Rolf Heuer, shuffled his...

Jul 15, 2023

8 wild stories about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the 'father of the atomic bomb'

J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904 -1967) is infamous for spearheading the development of the world's first atomic bomb — but the physicist's life was far from boring outside the lab. Here are eight intriguing stories about Oppenheimer, drawn from the biography American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer...

Jul 21, 2023

Scientists just made the largest quasicrystal ever — because one of them bet it couldn't be done

By jiggling thousands of metal beads in a tray for a week, researchers have created the largest-ever quasicrystal — a structure that scientists previously considered impossible. First represented in the irregular, non-repeating tile patterns of early Islamic art, quasicrystals are crystals whose atoms fit into an ordered arrangement and yet,...

Jul 21, 2023

Scientists observe metal repairing itself for the first time. Could Terminator robots be on the horizon?

For the first time, scientists have spotted metal healing itself after cracking — an observation that could pave the way for the creation of structures and robots capable of mending themselves. But for those worrying about the rise of real-life Terminator robots — don't: The newly discovered mechanism only works...

Jul 22, 2023

How do sandcastles stay together?

Despite sand's crumbly nature, the world's tallest sandcastle to date — built in Blokhus, Denmark, in 2021 — stood a staggering 69 feet, 5 inches (21.16 meters) high, according to Guinness World Records. But how do sandcastles stay together? It requires the right mix of sand, water and air. Sand...

Aug 1, 2023

Bizarre particle that can remember its own past created inside quantum computer

A weirdo particle that can remember its own past has been created inside a quantum computer, and scientists think it could be used to probe even deeper into quantum phenomena. The quasiparticles, called non-abelian anyons, maintain records of their previous location when swapped with each other — enabling physicists to...

Aug 4, 2023

Did scientists really create a room temperature superconductor? Not so fast, experts say.

Scientists in South Korea have claimed to have made one of the holy grails of physics: a superconductor at room temperatures and pressures. Now, researchers around the world are racing to replicate the results. The material, called LK-99, has been presented by its creators as one that can carry electricity...

Aug 7, 2023

Room-temperature superconductors: The facts behind the 'holy grail' of physics

Since their first discovery in 1911, superconductors — materials which perfectly conduct electricity — have long beguiled and tantalized physicists. Superconductors are used in particle accelerators, nuclear fusion devices, MRI machines, and even maglev trains. Yet broader and more common applications are hampered by a forbidding temperature limit — so...

Aug 9, 2023

2nd nuclear fusion breakthrough brings us a (tiny) step closer to limitless clean energy

A nuclear fusion reaction that gives out more energy than puts in has been demonstrated by U.S. scientists for a second time. The successful experiment takes us one small but meaningful step closer to creating a new source of limitless clean energy. By firing the world's most energetic laser beam...

Aug 10, 2023

Bizarre 'demon' particle found inside superconductor could help unlock a 'holy grail' of physics

An elusive demon particle has been observed inside a superconductor nearly 70 years after it was first predicted. Its discovery could help resolve the mystery of how superconductors work. Pines' demon is a transparent, chargeless particle discovered inside a sample of the superconductor strontium ruthenate. It is a plasmon —...

Aug 11, 2023

Wobbling muon experiment could reveal a 5th force of nature — if the results hold up

A tiny wobbling particle may be about to reveal a fifth force of nature, scientists behind one of the biggest particle physics experiments say. Physicists at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, or Fermilab, near Chicago have found more evidence that the muon, a subatomic particle, is wobbling far more than...

Aug 17, 2023

'Strange metals' used in superconductors can entangle whole seas of electrons at once, and scientists finally understand how

Physicists have come up with a universal theory to explain how a group of bizarre metals behave, and it could aid the search for a room-temperature superconductor. Strange metals are a type of quantum material with some truly weird properties: Not only do they flout the rules of electrical resistance...

Aug 18, 2023

Turns out you can transmit sound in a vacuum, just not very far

For the first time, scientists have shown that sound can travel through the emptiness of a vacuum. However, the rule-breaking trick requires specific circumstances and can only be carried out over extremely small distances. The iconic tagline of the 1979 sci-fi film Alien tells us that in space no one...