A team of researchers from RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia has reportedly made a ‘once-in-a-decade discovery’ that will radically change how we do chemistry. The discovery? The creation of two-dimensional materials no thicker than a few atoms — something that’s never been seen before in nature.   The research that led to this incredible find was led

You might never have wondered why the Universe has just three spatial dimensions, but it is a question that has long vexed physicists. An idea that mixes particle physics with something called knot theory could not only offer an explanation, it might also provide insight into what powered the colossal growth-spurt the Universe experienced just

The discovery of a unique property in what’s known as a Majorana fermion has given researchers an easy way to spot the real deal from a fraud. Such particles are famous for being their own antiparticle, a feature that makes them appealing candidates for qubits in certain kinds of quantum computers. But until now identifying

At just 53 attoseconds, a single flash of an X-ray laser has become the shortest light pulse of its kind in the history of optics, smashing the previous record by 14 attoseconds. As cool as it is, the record light pulse is more than just about bragging rights. The advance will improve research that requires

The electric honeycomb, or rose window instability, is a curious phenomenon. It occurs when a high-voltage corona charge – the ionisation of air surrounding a conductor – is applied from a vertical needle over oil on a steel plate. The surface wrinkles up into a structure resembling a honeycomb, or a rose window – hence

Scientists have set a new record in optical measurements using photons, achieving a level of precision that before now was only possible in the world of theory. In a first-of-its-kind experiment, a team of physicists has broken through what’s called the shot-noise limit – maximising the amount of information that can be extracted from individual

One of the most peculiar aspects of quantum theory is the observer effect, the idea that the very act of observing and measuring something – just observing and measuring, nothing more – can actually change it in some way. Now researchers have determined via theoretical modelling that this effect can change the flow of energy

Elon Musk showed off his new 280-character Twitter limit in the best way possible Thursday morning: musing about the Singularity with the official Rick and Morty Twitter account. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO first revealed he watched the sci-fi show back in August only after a fan asked the question on everyone’s mind.   Musk said

Researchers have at last been able to model the behaviour of electrons under extreme densities and temperatures, similar to those found inside stars and planets. Although electrons are ubiquitous in our universe, carrying electrical current and determining the physical properties of materials, physicists have never before been able to describe the ways large numbers of

A new atomic clock has extended from one dimension to three, becoming the most precise timekeeper in existence – just 3.5 parts error in 10 quintillion (that’s 1 followed by 19 zeroes) in two hours. The clock was built by JILA, a collaboration between the University of Colorado and the National Institute of Standards and

Jacques Dubochet, Joachim Frank and Richard Henderson have won the Nobel Prize in chemistry “for developing cryo-electron microscopy for the high-resolution structure determination of biomolecules in solution,” the Nobel committee announced Wednesday. Cryo-electron microscopy is “a cool method for imaging the materials of life,” said Nobel committee member Göran K. Hansson from Stockholm. The development

There’s a lot we don’t know about the actinides. On the periodic table, this series of heavy, radioactive elements hangs at the bottom, and includes a host of mysterious substances that don’t naturally occur on Earth. Among this cast of unknowns, berkelium looks to be even stranger than we realised. New experiments with this incredibly

Rainer Weiss, Barry C. Barish and Kip S. Thorne have won the 2017 Nobel Prize in physics. The three are members of the LIGO-Virgo detector collaboration that discovered gravitational waves. “This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world,” said the Nobel committee representative during a news conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.  

Questions of whether our reality is a simulation of something deeper have kept philosophers and freshmen awake since Plato was a pup. A pair of physicists sleep a lot easier at night now that they’ve shown that quantum weirdness involving twists in space-time can’t conceivably be simulated, adding to a list of problems that The

Update 27/09/17: It’s happening! We have confirmation that the LIGO team will go ahead with the rumoured announcement today at 6:30pm Italian time (that’s 12:30pm EST). We’ll be doing a live blog when that happens so stay tuned for a link to that right here!   Time to keep a close eye on the LIGO announcement

Ever since the EM drive first made headlines, science lovers have puzzled over how the propulsion system seems to produce thrust, despite the fact it’s ‘impossible’ according to one of the most fundamental laws of physics – Newton’s third law of motion. Now a team of physicists have put forward an alternative explanation – it

Since the mid-twentieth century, two theories of physics have offered powerful yet incompatible models of the physical universe.  General relativity brings space and time together into the (then) portmanteau space-time, the curvature of which is gravity. It works really well on large scales, such as interplanetary or interstellar space.   But zoom into the subatomic, and things

Wrapping your messages up with quantum weirdness is a great way to avoid sneaky eavesdropping, but in its current form it’s more like Morse code than high speed ADSL broadband. That could be set to change with a radical advancement in quantum technology that copies entangled patterns of light to help relay quantum codes, potentially

Scientists have discovered the existence of a type of particle that’s never previously been observed, which demonstrates unprecedented chemical stability for its kind. It’s big news for chemists and physicists – but the achievement isn’t just exciting for theoretical scientists, because, if researchers can figure out how to make it in the lab, it could

For half a century, historians have wondered if Viking sailors travelled long distances under dense cloud cover under the guidance of a crystal called a sunstone. Conclusive evidence might be forever buried in the past, but a new study details the kinds of conditions ancient mariners might have used this tool, demonstrating it was possible

Quantum computers based on the twisting pathways of moving particles have so far lived only in theory – the particles they would rely on might not even exist. But with the exciting discovery of electrons ‘swirling’ down a wire, the hunt is over for exactly the particles such quantum devices have been waiting for. Now

Researchers have uncovered what they say is a new class of ultra-low-density ice, which crystallises amid extreme negative pressure on water molecules. While many of us are only familiar with the kind of frozen water that keeps our drinks nice and chilled, regular ice on Earth is just one of around 20 known phases of

While physicists have managed to wrap their minds around chaos theory in the macroscopic world, chaos also has its way at the quantum scale. And in many ways quantum chaos is even more perplexing than its large-scale counterpart. Which is why it’s such a big deal that researchers have now presented a single equation that can predict

When they’re just hanging out in most metals, electrons are pretty chill. They move about individually and freely to conduct heat and electricity. But in some rare situations, it turns out they can start moving together as a group. And that weird effect has been spotted taking place in a piece of antiferromagnetic superconducting material

Light is pretty awesome. It’s made of subatomic particles called photons, which also behave like waves. It’s been demonstrated to act like both a particle and a wave simultaneously. Photons can be entangled at a distance. They reflect, refract and diffract. They have angular momentum, but no mass. One thing they had never been observed

Physicists have finally observed a quantum interaction between a group of four entangled electrons. Until now, this interaction was purely theoretical, but now it’s been caught in action by cleverly cooling a superconducting crystal and stressing it under high pressure. The results of this exciting experiment are now opening doors to further refining our knowledge of

Researchers have shown that crystals can be so flexible they can be bent repeatedly and even tied up in knots, overhauling our current understanding of the structures, and challenging the very definition of a crystal. As we learnt in school, crystals are brittle and inelastic – if you try to bend a crystal of rock

A two-step cooling process using lasers has allowed physicists to push molecules of calcium monofluoride down to a record low temperature, busting a barrier that until now has been impassable. Decades ago, chilling individual atoms to near absolute zero opened a new world of research for particle physicists. This latest breakthrough could also provide fertile

Black holes are the most intense and mysterious cosmic phenomena in the Universe, and new research shows we understand even less about them than we thought we did. A long-standing assumption about the physics taking place in the space immediately surrounding these matter-consuming voids has been found to be incorrect, and the discovery could derail

Chinese scientists have successfully sent information between entangled particles through sea water, the first time this type of quantum communication has been achieved underwater. In this proof-of-concept experiment, information was sent across a 3.3-metre (10.8-foot) long tank of seawater, but the researchers predict they should be able to use the same technique to send unhackable

The pulling power of the world’s strongest resistive magnet now stands at 41.4 teslas, thanks to the efforts of scientists at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (or MagLab), part of Florida State University. Taking two-and-a-half years and $3.5 million in funding to build, the magnet smashed the previous record of 38.5 teslas earlier this

In early July, Google announced that it will expand its commercially available cloud computing services to include quantum computing. A similar service has been available from IBM since May. These aren’t services most regular people will have a lot of reason to use yet. But making quantum computers more accessible will help government, academic and

Time to keep a close eye on the LIGO announcement schedule, folks, because if rumours are to be believed, we might be in for a big gravitational wave announcement very soon. At this stage, we’re in the realm of speculation – nothing has been officially confirmed or denied. But there are pretty exciting hints out

Extracting useful amounts of energy from the merging of atoms is tricky business, not least thanks to the challenges of controlling squirming clouds of ultra-hot plasma. Our clean power fusion goals could be a step closer now researchers have tweaked their fusion recipe to add a new ion to the mix. This allows researchers to

Electrons have been caught flowing through graphene like a liquid, reaching limits physicists thought were fundamentally impossible. This type of conductance is known as ‘superballistic’ flow, and this new experiment suggests it could revolutionise the way we conduct electricity.   If that’s not crazy enough, the super-fast flows actually occur as a result of electrons

Make mine a Laphroaig Islay single malt, at least 18 years in the barrel. Oh, and a side of water. Science says you can wipe that condescending smirk from your face, while you’re at it. A lot of whisky drinkers (or whiskey if you prefer the Irish spelling) will tell you a dash of H2O

A small tweak on a definitive experiment in quantum physics has allowed scientists to observe for the first time exactly how molecules behave as waves. The results are solidly in line with what theory covering complex quantum phenomena predicts, so don’t expect any radical new physics here. But as with most quantum experiments, the implications

It’s been about nine months since a team of CERN researchers succeeded in their goal of measuring the spectrum of light emitted from hydrogen’s mirror particle, antihydrogen. They were just getting started. Now the researchers have detailed evidence of the structure of antihydrogen using spectroscopy, setting a landmark in our quest to determine why there

Using a device not much bigger than a wine bottle, physicists have for the first time observed neutrinos physically colliding with the nucleus of an atom. The discovery provides physicists with another way to probe this ghostly particle, one that could help us better understand some of the Universe’s biggest mysteries.   Neutrinos are easy

It all started when a Ukrainian programmer and aspiring rapper dropped a handful of hydrogel balls on his piping-hot pancake griddle. The beads, used by gardeners to hydrate plants because they’re about 98 percent water, began to bounce. The man recorded their jig of little hops for several minutes, complete with the horrible screeching sounds the spheres

Scientists have observed how a magnetic dipole field can create what looks like a glowing, localised fireball inside a plasma chamber. By placing a regular dipole bar magnet near the surface of the cathode, the researchers were able to generate an intense “glowing, fireball like structure” inside the plasma chamber, which varied in its brightness

It’s been exactly 80 years since the theoretical physicist Ettore Majorana predicted that there were neutrally charged particles that were indistinguishable from their own antiparticle. None have been spotted in the wild, and not for want of looking. Physicists now have the next best thing – a particle-like system that behaves just like the kind

An odd phenomenon in quantum mechanics called backflow has just gotten a little weirder with new research showing not only can particles seem to ignore momentum and leap backwards, they are able to do so while a force urges them on. This is the first time the property has been theoretically mapped out to show

Scans taken of fluids moving through rock have shown engineers have had it wrong when it comes to substances flowing through porous materials. For the past century, the movement of gases and liquids through rocks has been modelled using a law that assumes they flow in a stable pattern. Under the microscope, it turns out

Not all ice is the same. In distant realms far beyond this world’s Slurpees, melting glaciers, and the Ice Bucket Challenge, water hardens into a solid state in strange ways that just aren’t possible here on Planet Earth. Now, for the first time, scientists have managed to catch one of these alien, otherworldly ices in

Not long ago, in the early 1990s, scientists only speculated that teleportation using quantum physics could be possible. Since then, the process has become a standard operation in quantum optics labs around the world. In fact, just last year, two separate teams conducted the world’s first quantum teleportation outside of a laboratory. Now, researchers in China

It’s not something many people think about when they drop a few ice cubes into their beverage of choice, but the tiny ice crystals that go into them are not perfect cubes – and no one has ever produced an ice cube formed from perfectly cubic crystals in the lab. But now researchers have come

The Large Hadron Collider has once again done what it does best – smash bits of matter together and find new particles in the carnage. This time physicists have come across a real charmer. It’s four times heavier than a proton and could help challenge some ideas about how this kind of matter sticks together.