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Archive for the ‘physics’ category: Page 172

Oct 4, 2019

Underground Detector in Japan to Join Search for Gravitational Waves

Posted by in category: physics

A fourth gravitational wave detector, this one in Gifu Prefecture, Japan, will join the global search for cosmic events that cause ripples in spacetime, beginning this December.

The Kamioka Gravitational-Wave Detector (KAGRA) is in its commissioning phase, according to a press release, and will join the two LIGO detectors in the United States well as the Virgo detector in Italy. The three facilities will share data, serving as independent verifiers of each other’s results.

Oct 4, 2019

Molecular hydrogen becomes semimetallic at pressures above 350 GPa

Posted by in category: physics

According to condensed matter physics predictions, at a high enough pressure, hydrogen should dissociate and transform into an atomic metal. However, the exact pressure range at which this occurs has not yet been ascertained, and the process through which hydrogen becomes a metal is still somewhat unclear.

In a recent study, researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Chemistry demonstrated that at a pressure of 350–360 GPa and at temperatures below 200K, molecular starts to conduct and becomes semimetallic. Their paper, published in Nature Physics, provides interesting new insight about the transition of hydrogen at high pressures, unveiling some of the properties it acquires.

“Typically, metallic hydrogen is considered to be atomic hydrogen—a crystal built from protons after dissociation of the molecules,” Mikhail Eremets, one of the researchers who carried out the study, told Phys.org. “However, hydrogen can also transform into a metal in the molecular state—in this case, electronic bands of molecular hydrogen crystal broaden and eventually overlap so that the band gap closes, free electrons and holes appear—this is metallic state.”

Oct 2, 2019

Squid-inspired robots might have environmental, propulsion applications

Posted by in categories: military, physics, robotics/AI

Inspired by the unique and efficient swimming strategy of cephalopods, scientists developed an aquatic robot that mimics their form of propulsion.

These , squidlike robots are made of , which make them hard to detect—an advantage that has potential military reconnaissance and scientific applications—while maintaining a low environmental footprint.

Physicists Xiaobo Bi and Qiang Zhu used to illustrate the physical mechanisms and fluid mechanics of a squid’s swimming method, which uses intermittent bursts through pulsed jet propulsion. By using this form of locomotion, the new can achieve impressive speeds, just like its animal inspiration. Bi and Zhu discuss their work in this week’s Physics of Fluids.

Oct 1, 2019

Chasing gravitational waves

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

When LIGO and Virgo detected the echoes that likely came from a collision between a black hole and a neutron star, dozens of physicists began a hunt for the signal’s electromagnetic counterpart.

Oct 1, 2019

Moore’s Law Is Dying. This Brain-Inspired Analogue Chip Is a Glimpse of What’s Next

Posted by in categories: computing, neuroscience, physics

“Dark silicon” sounds like a magical artifact out of a fantasy novel. In reality, it’s one branch of a three-headed beast that foretells the end of advances in computation.

Ok—that might be too dramatic. But the looming problems in silicon-based computer chips are very real. Although computational power has exploded exponentially in the past five decades, we’ve begun hitting some intractable limits in further growth, both in terms of physics and economics.

Moore’s Law is dying. And chipmakers around the globe are asking, now what?

Sep 30, 2019

Scientists find way to travel across ‘very distant points in space’ in a split second

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics, space travel

A WORMHOLE could allow space travel to the most distant regions of the universe in an instant and now a recent scientific paper has outlined a way to actually build on these anomalies of physics.

Sep 28, 2019

Pope Francis Warns Companies to Use Artificial Intelligence for the ‘Common Good’

Posted by in categories: government, physics, robotics/AI

(VATICAN CITY) — Pope Francis on Friday warned tech company executives, diplomats and financiers that the race to create artificial intelligence and other forms of digital development pose the risk of increasing social inequality unless the work is accompanied by an ethical evaluation of the common good.

Francis addressed a Vatican conference that brought government envoys and Facebook and Google representatives together with philosophers, physicists and ethicists. A smattering of academics and Catholic bishops rounded out participants at “The Common Good in the Digital Age” conference.

The three-day gathering is the latest evidence of the Vatican wanting a place in the debate over the prospects and perils of artificial intelligence.

Sep 27, 2019

Hidden Gravitational Wave Signal Reveals that Black Holes Are ‘Bald’

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

Are black holes bald or hairy? It all depends on the details of a fleeting gravitational wave.

Sep 27, 2019

Physicists score double hit in LED research

Posted by in categories: computing, physics

In two breakthroughs in the realm of photonics, City College of New York graduate researchers are reporting the successful demonstration of an LED (light-emitting diode) based on half-light half-matter quasiparticles in atomically thin materials. This is also the first successful test of an electrically driven light emitter using atomically thin semiconductors embedded in a light trapping structure (optical cavity).

The research is led by graduate physics student Jie Gu and post-doctoral fellow Biswanath Chakraborty, in collaboration with another , Mandeep Khatoniyar.

According to Vinod Menon, chair of physics in City College’s Division of Science and the research team’s mentor, their double feat, reported in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, marks an important milestone in the field of 2-D materials and, more broadly, LEDs.

Sep 27, 2019

Nobel laureates join call for European Commission to reinstate top science post

Posted by in categories: economics, education, physics, science

More than 9000 scientists, including Andre Geim, Carlo Rubbia and eight other Nobel-prize-winning physicists, have signed a letter calling on the European Commission (EC) to reinstate a dedicated commissioner for education and research. The letter claims that that an out-and-out role for education and research is necessary to create a sound basis for innovation in Europe.

News of the apparent sidelining of science emerged when Ursula von der Leyen, the EC’s president-elect, presented her team and the new structure of the next European Commission on 10 September. It included her candidates for the new set of 18 commissioners, but the plan no longer included a commissioner that explicitly represents education and research.

These areas are instead expected to be covered by the commissioner for innovation and youth – the nominee for which is Mariya Gabriel, who is the current commissioner for digital economy and society. In the new set-up, the innovation and youth role appears to be a merger between the current directorate for research, science and innovation with that for education, culture, youth and sport.