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Jul 10, 2024

Laser Tests reveal New Insights into Key Mineral for Super-Earths

Posted by in categories: particle physics, space

Scientists have for the first time observed how atoms in magnesium oxide morph and melt under ultra-harsh conditions, providing new insights into this key mineral within Earth’s mantle that is known to influence planet formation.

High-energy laser experiments — which subjected tiny crystals of the mineral to the type of heat and pressure found deep inside a rocky planet’s mantle — suggest the compound could be the earliest mineral to solidify out of magma oceans in forming “super-Earth” exoplanets.

“Magnesium oxide could be the most important solid controlling the thermodynamics of young super-Earths,” said June Wicks, an assistant professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins University who led the research. “If it has this very high melting temperature, it would be the first solid to crystallize when a hot, rocky planet starts to cool down and its interior separates into a core and a mantle.”

Jul 9, 2024

Cognify — A Prison Of The Mind We’ve Seen Before In SF

Posted by in categories: law enforcement, particle physics, robotics/AI, space

So I serve a hundred years in one day…’- Joe Haldeman, 2011.

Robot Preachers Found To Undermine Religious Commitment ‘Tell me your torments,’ the Padre said, in an elderly voice marked with compassion. — Philip K. Dick, 1969.

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Jul 9, 2024

Matter-wave interferometry puts new limits on ‘chameleon particles’

Posted by in category: particle physics

Gravity measurement benefits from optical lattice.

Jul 9, 2024

Ab initio methods help scientists make sense of complex particle collisions

Posted by in categories: particle physics, quantum physics

When atomic nuclei and subatomic particles interact, the results are incredibly complex. These are the “many body problems” of quantum mechanics. To help make sense of these interactions, scientists create ways to simplify the range of possible outcomes.

One example is “effective interactions,” which simplify the interactions between a (a or a neutron) and an atomic nucleus. Effective interactions help scientists develop theories of the reactions that result when nuclei collide with each other or with .

These tools are part of a group of methods called effective field theory (EFT). EFT in turn is a type of approach called “ab initio,” or “first principles.” Ab initio means a calculation starts with the established laws of physics without any other assumptions.

Jul 9, 2024

One of the greatest mysteries of science could be one step closer to being solved

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics, quantum physics, science

Around 80% of the universe’s matter is dark, meaning it is invisible. Despite being imperceptible, dark matter constantly streams through us at a rate of trillions of particles per second. We know it exists due to its gravitational effects, yet direct detection has remained elusive.

Researchers from Lancaster University, the University of Oxford, and Royal Holloway, University of London, are leveraging cutting-edge quantum technologies to build the most sensitive dark matter detectors to date. Their project, titled “A Quantum View of the Invisible Universe,” is featured at the Royal Society’s Summer Science Exhibition. Related research is also published in the Journal of Low Temperature Physics

The team includes Dr. Michael Thompson, Professor Edward Laird, Dr. Dmitry Zmeev, and Dr. Samuli Autti from Lancaster, Professor Jocelyn Monroe from Oxford, and Professor Andrew Casey from RHUL.

Jul 9, 2024

Steven Weinberg — Why a Fine-Tuned Universe?

Posted by in category: particle physics

How can so many numbers of nature—the constants and relationships of physics—be so spot-on perfect for humans to exist? Coincidence and luck seem wildly unlikely. This question causes controversy, among scientists and among philosophers. Beware: there is more than one answer lurking here.

Free access to Closer to Truth’s library of 5,000 videos: http://bit.ly/376lkKN

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Jul 9, 2024

Scientists successfully create a time crystal made of giant atoms

Posted by in categories: particle physics, space

A crystal is an arrangement of atoms that repeats itself in space, in regular intervals: At every point, the crystal looks exactly the same. In 2012, Nobel Prize winner Frank Wilczek raised the question: Could there also be a time crystal—an object that repeats itself not in space but in time? And could it be possible that a periodic rhythm emerges, even though no specific rhythm is imposed on the system and the interaction between the particles is completely independent of time?

For years, Frank Wilczek’s idea has caused much controversy. Some considered time crystals to be impossible in principle, while others tried to find loopholes and realize time crystals under certain special conditions.

Now, a particularly spectacular kind of time crystal has successfully been created at Tsinghua University in China, with the support from TU Wien in Austria.

Jul 9, 2024

This Tiny Particle Could Upend Everything We Know About Gravity—And the Universe—Scientists Say

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics, quantum physics

A scientific breakthrough on the tiniest scale could soon help us answer the universe’s greatest mysteries.

Jul 9, 2024

Huge neutrino detector sees first hints of particles from exploding stars

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics

Kamiokande-II saw the first supernova neutrinos from the famous SN 1987A.


Every few seconds, somewhere in the observable Universe, a massive star collapses and unleashes a supernova explosion. Japan’s Super-Kamiokande observatory might now be collecting a steady trickle of neutrinos from those cataclysms, physicists say — amounting to a few detections a year.

These tiny subatomic particles are central to understanding what goes on inside a supernova: because they zip out of the star’s collapsing core and across space, they can provide information about any potentially new physics that occur under extreme conditions.

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Jul 9, 2024

Scientists develop new technique for bespoke optical tweezers

Posted by in category: particle physics

Scientists have developed a new way to trap small particles with light. Building on the Nobel Prize winning technique of optical tweezers (Arthur Ashkin, 2018), a team of physicists, led by Dr. David Phillips at the University of Exeter, has advanced the possibilities of optical trapping.

The research paper, published in the journal Science Advances, is titled “Photon-efficient optical via wavefront shaping.”

Conventional optical tweezers, developed in the 1980s, are a tightly focused laser beam which can attract and trap certain micro-sized particles or organisms, akin to grabbing something with a pair of tweezers.

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