Lifeboat Foundation

Experiments on a bed of plastic beads reveal a temperature-dependent stiffening over time, which appears to be related to molecular-scale deformations.

Inside a geological fault, small rocks and pebble-sized grains can become increasingly lodged together over time so that the push—or stress—needed to get the granular material flowing grows with time. This frictional “aging” can be attributed to several effects, but researchers have now isolated a thermal effect that appears to be related to molecular-level deformations [1]. The team performed experiments on a bed of tiny beads, or grains, slowly rotating them in a start–stop manner that revealed the signatures of grain aging. The temperature dependence of the effect suggested that the behavior arises from a thermally driven interlocking between irregularities on the grain surfaces. The results could provide new insights into the stick–slip behavior recorded in geological faults.

Granular materials—those made of small particles, like sand or soil—have unique properties. For example, in the polymer industry, the force required to begin stirring granular ingredients on Mondays is greater than on other days because the grains have been left immobile over the weekend. This aging effect, in which the force required to break the network of frictional contacts depends on the time that the particles have been resting, also plays a role in the occurrence of earthquakes and landslides. “The longer you wait, the stronger the granular network becomes,” says Kasra Farain from the University of Amsterdam.

An international team of physicists, centered at Trinity, has proven new theorems in quantum mechanics that describe the “energy landscapes” of collections of quantum particles.

This high-mobility film shows unprecedented potential.

A team including researchers from the Laboratory for High Energy Physics at the University of Bern has successfully measured the interaction rates of neutrinos at unprecedented energies using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. The study was published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

While nuclear physicists know the strong interaction is what holds together the particles at the heart of matter, we still have a lot to learn about this fundamental force. Results published earlier this year in Physical Review D by three researchers in the Center for Theoretical and Computational Physics at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility bring us closer to understanding an important piece of the strong interaction puzzle.

At the very smallest scales, our intuitive view of reality no longer applies. It’s almost as if physics is fundamentally indecisive, a truth that gets harder to ignore as we zoom in on the particles that pixelate our Univerrse.

In order to better understand it, physicists had to devise an entirely new framework to place it in, one based on probability over certainty. This is quantum theory, and it describes all sorts of phenomena, from entanglement to superposition.

Yet in spite of a century of experiments showing just how useful quantum theory is at explaining what we see, it’s hard to shake our ‘classical’ view of the Universe’s building blocks as reliable fixtures in time and space. Even Einstein was forced to ask his fellow physicist, “Do you really believe the Moon is not there when you are not looking at it?”

With new W-boson, top quark, and Higgs boson measurements, the LHC contradicts earlier Fermilab results. The Standard Model still holds.

In the world of physics, the idea of particles moving faster than light has always been a bit of a wild card. These particles, known as tachyons, have stirred up debates and skepticism.

However, a recent study published in Physical Review D has shaken up our understanding of these enigmatic particles.

For a long time, tachyons were considered more of a theoretical oddity than a scientific possibility. They seemed to conflict with the special theory of relativity, which has been a cornerstone of modern physics.

Physicists at the University of Konstanz have discovered a way to imprint a previously unseen geometrical form of chirality onto electrons using laser light, creating chiral coils of mass and charge.

This breakthrough in manipulating electron chirality has vast implications for quantum optics, particle physics, and electron microscopy, paving the way for new scientific explorations and technological innovations.

Understanding Chirality and Its Implications.