Mysterious antimatter observed falling down for first time

For the first time, scientists have observed antimatter particles—the mysterious twins of the visible matter all around us—falling downwards due to the effect of gravity, Europe's physics lab CERN announced on Wednesday.

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Scientists observe interaction of components in tire rubber at the atomic scale

Scientists have observed the molecular motion of rubber components typically used in automobile tires—polybutadiene and carbon black—with the world's fastest time resolution.

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A new highly precise measurement of the hypertriton lifetime

A hypertriton is a tritium nucleus in which a neutron is replaced by a so-called Lambda hyperon. This type of hypernucleus was first discovered in the 1950s has since been the key focus of numerous studies.

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The LHC lead-ion collision run starts

The LHC is back delivering collisions to the experiments after the successful leak repair in August. But instead of protons, it is now the turn of lead ion beams to collide, marking the first heavy-ion run in five years.

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The catch-22s of reservoir computing: Researchers find overlooked weakness in powerful machine learning tool

In nonlinear dynamic systems, a change in one place can trigger an outsized change elsewhere. The climate, the workings of the human brain, and the behavior of the electric grid are all examples—and all change dramatically over time. Because of their inherent unpredictability, dynamic systems like these are notoriously difficult to model.

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Antimatter embraces Earth, falling downward like normal matter: Study reveals gravity's effect on matter's elusive twin

For those still holding out hope that antimatter levitates rather than falls in a gravitational field, like normal matter, the results of a new experiment are a dose of cold reality.

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Milestone for novel atomic clock: X-ray laser shows possible route to substantially increased precision time measurement

An international research team has taken a decisive step toward a new generation of atomic clocks. At the European XFEL X-ray laser, the researchers have created a much more precise pulse generator based on the element scandium, which enables an accuracy of one second in 300 billion years—that is about a thousand times more precise than the current standard atomic clock based on cesium. The team presents its success in the journal Nature.

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Chi-Nu experiment ends, bolsters nuclear security and energy reactors

The results of the Chi-Nu physics experiment at Los Alamos National Laboratory have contributed essential, never-before-observed data for enhancing nuclear security applications, understanding criticality safety and designing fast-neutron energy reactors. The Chi-Nu project, a years-long experiment measuring the energy spectrum of neutrons emitted from neutron-induced fission, recently concluded the most detailed and extensive uncertainty analysis of the three major actinide elements—uranium-238, uranium-235 and plutonium-239.

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Researchers prepare for exascale supercomputer simulations of nuclear reactors

Nuclear energy is responsible for approximately one-fifth of total electricity used in the U.S., and nearly half of the country's renewable electricity. Most of the reactors generating this electricity were built decades ago. The construction of new nuclear reactors that use advanced technologies and processes could help grow the amount of carbon-free electricity the nuclear power industry produces and help the U.S. progress toward a net zero economy.

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Memory-induced Magnus effect: Looking at the unexpected curveball in miniature

Whether you are familiar with the term "Magnus effect" or not, you have certainly seen it in action. It is when a spinning ball—for instance in football, cricket or baseball—bends away from its expected trajectory, often to the surprise of the opposing team. The principle also has engineering uses, for example to propel certain types of ships or aircraft using a "Flettner rotor."

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Why Einstein must be wrong: In search of the theory of gravity

Einstein's theory of gravity—general relativity—has been very successful for more than a century. However, it has theoretical shortcomings. This is not surprising: the theory predicts its own failure at spacetime singularities inside black holes—and the Big Bang itself.

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ATLAS measures strength of the strong force with record precision

Binding together quarks into protons, neutrons and atomic nuclei is a force so strong, it's in the name. The strong force, which is carried by gluon particles, is the strongest of all fundamental forces of nature—the others being electromagnetism, the weak force and gravity. Yet, it's the least precisely measured of these four forces.

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Theoretical study shows that Kerr black holes could amplify new physics

Black holes are regions in space characterized by extremely strong gravity, which prevents all matter and electromagnetic waves from escaping it. These fascinating cosmic bodies have been the focus of countless research studies, yet their intricate physical nuances are yet to be fully uncovered.

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Researchers make progress in vector meson spin physics

A research team led by Prof. Wang Qun from the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has made significant progress in the theoretical study of vector meson spin physics, specifically regarding the intriguing behavior of ϕ mesons generated during collisions between gold nuclei.

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Quiet cables set to help reveal rare physics events

Imagine trying to tune a radio to a single station but instead encountering static noise and interfering signals from your own equipment. That is the challenge facing research teams searching for evidence of extremely rare events that could help understand the origin and nature of matter in the universe. It turns out that when you are trying to tune into some of the universe's weakest signals, it helps to make your instruments very quiet.

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A model probing the connection between entangled particles and wormholes in general relativity

Quantum entanglement is a physical process through which pairs of particles become connected and remain so even when separated by vast distances. This fascinating phenomenon has been the focus of numerous research studies, due to its mysterious nature and promising real-world applications.

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SLAC fires up the world's most powerful X-ray laser: LCLS-II ushers in a new era of science

The newly upgraded Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory successfully produced its first X-rays, and researchers around the world are already lined up to kick off an ambitious science program.

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Researchers explore theorized dark photons in connection with dark matter

A team of international researchers, led by experts at the University of Adelaide, has uncovered further clues in the quest for insights into the nature of dark matter.

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The limits of nuclear stability change in stellar environments where temperatures reach billions of degrees Celsius

New research is challenging the scientific status quo on the limits of the nuclear chart in hot stellar environments where temperatures reach billions of degrees Celsius.

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Study estimates the energy costs of information processing in biological systems

The behaviors, physiology and existence of living organisms is supported by countless biological processes, which entail the communication between cells and other molecular components. These molecular components are known to transmit information to each other in various ways, for instance via processes know as diffusion and electrical depolarization or by exchanging mechanical waves.

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ATLAS experiment places some of the tightest limits yet on magnetic monopoles

Magnets, those everyday objects we stick to our fridges, all share a unique characteristic: they always have both a north and a south pole. Even if you tried breaking a magnet in half, the poles would not separate—you would only get two smaller dipole magnets. But what if a particle could have a single pole with a magnetic charge?

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Examining the intriguing details of collisions at extreme energies

The initial phases of heavy-ion collisions occurring at the maximum energies available at the CERN Large Hadron Collider continue to remain an enigma of modern nuclear physics. New theoretical tools improved by physicists from the Institute of Nuclear Physics of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Cracow will help to unlock this mystery.

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Majority rule in complex mixtures: Study identifies new mechanism for control of phase separation

The very first life on Earth is thought to have developed from "protocells"—liquid mixtures of many different types of molecules. Researchers from the University of Göttingen have now shown that in such mixtures, small imbalances in the number of molecules of different types can have an unexpected effect.

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Scientists develop a mathematical model to optimize the design of thermal protection systems for spacecraft

Mechanics from St Petersburg University have developed a mathematical model that takes into account non-equilibrium processes occurring at high velocities in the gas flow and on the surface. This model can be used for detailed modeling of the interaction of gas with the surface of a spacecraft, which is extremely important when designing its thermal protection. The paper is published in the journal Physics of Fluids.

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The universe caught suppressing cosmic structure growth

As the universe evolves, scientists expect large cosmic structures to grow at a certain rate: dense regions such as galaxy clusters would grow denser, while the void of space would grow emptier.

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Researchers close in on the elusive neutrino

The humble neutrino, an elusive subatomic particle that passes effortlessly through normal matter, plays an outsized role among the particles that comprise our universe. To fully explain how our universe came to be, we need to know its mass. But, like so many of us, it avoids being weighed.

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Study explains role of certain types of oxide in the structure and development of specialty glass

A study conducted at the Center for Research, Education and Innovation in Vitreous Materials (CeRTEV) in São Carlos, São Paulo state, Brazil, shows for the first time that including niobium oxide (Nb2O5) in silicate glass results in silica network polymerization, which increases bond density and connectivity, enhancing the mechanical and thermal stability of specialty glass.

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Researchers observe electron scattering from radioisotopes that do not occur naturally for the first time

A team of chemists and physicists with members from Kyoto University, the Nishina Center for Accelerator-Based Science, RIKEN, Rikkyo University and Tohoku University, all in Japan, have for the first time observed electron scattering from radioisotopes that do not occur naturally. The study is published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

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Using an atomic clock to help find evidence of dark matter

A combined team of physicists from the University of Sussex and the National Physical Laboratory, both in the U.K., has been designing experiments to identify ultra-light dark matter particles. In their paper published in the open-access New Journal of Physics, the group describes how they are attempting to use the high precision of atomic clocks to detect ultra-light dark matter particle "kicks" that would lead to time variations and, in so doing, would show evidence of dark matter.

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Scientists make the first observation of a nucleus decaying into four particles after beta decay

Not all of the material around us is stable. Some materials may undergo radioactive decay to form more stable isotopes. Scientists have now observed a new decay mode for the first time. In this decay, a lighter form of oxygen, oxygen-13 (with eight protons and five neutrons), decays by breaking into three helium nuclei (an atom without the surrounding electrons), a proton, and a positron (the antimatter version of an electron).

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Physicists solve mysteries of microtubule movers

Active matter is any collection of materials or systems composed of individual units that can move on their own, thanks to self-propulsion or autonomous motion. They can be of any size—think clouds of bacteria in a petri dish, or schools of fish.

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HL-LHC magnet alignment system passes crucial tests

The many CERN-developed sensors and software programs of the FRAS (Full Remote Alignment System) have been successfully tested on a prototype magnet in preparation for the HL-LHC.

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Searching for dark matter with the world's most sensitive radio

Since the 1960s there has been plenty of evidence to support the existence of dark matter through astrophysical and cosmological observations, and at this point we're very confident that it exists. The question remains, though: what is dark matter actually made of?

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