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Category: particle physics – Page 48

Physicists Stunned: Lead-208’s Shape Just Broke a Fundamental Rule of Nuclear Physics

For decades, scientists believed that lead-208, a “doubly magic” and highly stable atomic nucleus, was perfectly spherical. However, groundbreaking new research has shattered this assumption, revealing that its nucleus is actually elongated, much like a rugby ball.

By using an advanced gamma-ray spectrometer and high-speed particle collisions, researchers uncovered unexpected quantum behavior that contradicts long-standing nuclear theory. This revelation forces physicists to rethink fundamental principles of nuclear structure, potentially reshaping our understanding of heavy elements and their formation in the universe.

Lead-208: A Surprising Discovery

Discarding a long-standing pessimistic hypothesis to rescue next-generation lithium-ion battery technology

In a megascience-scale collaboration with French researchers from College de France and the University of Montpellier, Skoltech scientists have shown a much-publicized problem with next-generation lithium-ion batteries to have been induced by the very experiments that sought to investigate it. Published in Nature Materials, the team’s findings suggest that the issue of lithium-rich cathode material deterioration should be approached from a different angle, giving hope for more efficient lithium-ion batteries that would store some 30% more energy.

Efficient energy storage is critical for the transition to a low-carbon economy, whether in grid-scale applications, electric vehicles, or portable devices. Lithium-ion batteries remain the best-developed electrochemical storage technology and promise further improvements. In particular, next-generation batteries with so-called lithium-rich cathodes could store about one-third more energy than their state-of-the-art counterparts with cathodes made of lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide, or NMC.

A key challenge hindering the commercialization of lithium-rich batteries is voltage fade and capacity drop. As the battery is repeatedly charged and discharged in the course of normal use, its cathode material undergoes degradation of unclear nature, causing gradual voltage and capacity loss. The problem is known to be associated with the reduction and oxidation of the in NMC, but the precise nature of this redox process is not understood. This theoretical gap undermines the attempts to overcome voltage fade and bring next-generation batteries to the market.

Researchers discover ‘topological Kerr effect’ in two-dimensional quantum magnets

In a recent collaboration between the High Magnetic Field Center of the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the University of Science and Technology of China, researchers introduced the concept of the topological Kerr effect (TKE) by utilizing the low-temperature magnetic field microscopy system and magnetic force microscopy imaging system supported by the steady-state high magnetic field experimental facility.

The findings, published in Nature Physics, hold significant promise for advancing our understanding of topological magnetic structures.

Originating in , skyrmions represent unique topological excitations found in condensed matter . These structures, characterized by their vortex or ring-like arrangement of spins, possess non-trivial properties that make them potential candidates for next-generation magnetic storage and logic devices.

A new kind of Hall effect: Physicists reveal potential of noncollinear antiferromagnets in spintronics

A team of researchers led by Colorado State University graduate student Luke Wernert and Associate Professor Hua Chen has discovered a new kind of Hall effect that could enable more energy-efficient electronic devices.

Their findings, published in Physical Review Letters in collaboration with graduate student Bastián Pradenas and Professor Oleg Tchernyshyov at Johns Hopkins University, reveal a previously unknown Hall mass in complex magnets called noncollinear antiferromagnets.

The Hall effect—first discovered by Edwin Hall at Johns Hopkins in 1879—usually refers to electric current flowing sideways when exposed to an external magnetic field, creating a measurable voltage. This sideways flow underpins everything from vehicle speed sensors to phone motion detectors. But in the CSU team’s work, electrons’ spin (a tiny, intrinsic form of angular momentum) takes center stage instead of .

Physicists develop energy filter technology to stabilize single-electron qubits

The Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) has developed a technology that controls the energy of single electrons in the desired form. This technology reduces the instability of electrons caused by external environments and enables stable quantum state implementation, making it a foundational technology to enhance the performance of single-electron qubits.

The research was conducted in collaboration with Jeonbuk National University, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), and Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), and the results were published in Nano Letters.

Electrons are fundamental particles that make up atoms, and when their paths are divided, they exhibit the quantum superposition phenomenon, passing through both paths (0 and 1) simultaneously.

Revealing the hidden symmetries of a superconductor

A possible method for probing the properties of exotic particles that exist on the surfaces of an unusual type of superconductor has been theoretically proposed by two RIKEN physicists.

The paper is published in the journal Physical Review B.

When cooled to very low temperatures, two or more electrons in some solids start to behave as if they were a single particle.

Signs of alien life may be hiding in these gases

Scientists have identified a promising new way to detect life on faraway planets, hinging on worlds that look nothing like Earth and gases rarely considered in the search for extraterrestrials.

In a new Astrophysical Journal Letters paper, researchers from the University of California, Riverside, describe these gases, which could be detected in the atmospheres of exoplanets—planets outside our solar system—with the James Webb Space Telescope, or JWST.

Called methyl halides, the gases comprise a , which bears a carbon and three hydrogen atoms, attached to a halogen atom such as chlorine or bromine. They’re primarily produced on Earth by bacteria, marine algae, fungi, and some plants.

Reading magnetic states faster—in far infrared

With today’s data rates of only a few hundred megabytes per second, access to digital information remains relatively slow. Initial experiments have already shown a promising new strategy: Magnetic states can be read out by short current pulses, whereby recently discovered spintronic effects in purpose-built material systems could remove previous speed restrictions.

Researchers at HZDR and TU Dortmund University are now providing proof of the feasibility of such ultrafast data sources. Instead of , they use ultrashort , thereby enabling the read-out of magnetic structures within picoseconds, as they report in the journal Nature Communications.

“We now can determine the magnetic orientation of a material much quicker with light-induced current pulses,” explains Dr. Jan-Christoph Deinert of HZDR’s Institute of Radiation Physics. For their experiments, the physicist and his team employed light that is invisible to the human eye—so-called terahertz radiation.

A new protocol to image wave functions in continuous space

In recent years, physicists have been trying to better understand the behavior of individual quantum particles as they move in space. Yet directly imaging these particles with high precision has so far proved challenging, due to the limitations of existing microscopy methods.

Researchers at CNRS and École Normale Supérieure in Paris, France, have now developed a new protocol to directly image the evolution of a single-atom wave packet, a delocalized quantum state that determines the probability that an associated atom will be found in a specific location. This imaging technique, introduced in Physical Review Letters, could open exciting possibilities for the precise study of complex quantum systems in continuous space.

“Our group is interested in the study of ultracold atoms, the coldest systems in the universe, just a few billionths of degrees above absolute zero, where matter displays fascinating behaviors,” Tarik Yefsah, senior author of the paper, told Phys.org. “One of these behaviors is the so-called superfluidity, a remarkable state of matter, where particles flow without friction.

Scientists take important step toward mitigating errors in analog quantum simulations of many-body problems

Simulations of quantum many-body systems are an important goal for nuclear and high-energy physics. Many-body problems involve systems that consist of many microscopic particles interacting at the level of quantum mechanics. They are much more difficult to describe than simple systems with just two particles. This means that even the most powerful conventional computers cannot simulate these problems.

Quantum computing has the potential to address this challenge using an approach called quantum simulation. To succeed, these simulations need theoretical approximations of how quantum computers represent many-body systems. In research on this topic, at the University of Washington developed a new framework to systematically analyze the interplay of these approximations. They showed that the impact of such approximations can be minimized by tuning simulation parameters.

The study is published in the journal Physical Review A.