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Phase transitions, shifts between different states of matter, are widely explored physical phenomena. So far, these transitions have primarily been studied in three-dimensional (3D) and two-dimensional (2D) systems, yet theories suggest that they could also occur in some one-dimensional (1D) systems.

Researchers at the Duke Quantum Center and the University of Maryland recently reported the first observation of a finite-energy phase transition in a 1D chain of atoms simulated on a . Their paper, published in Nature Physics, introduces a promising approach to realizing finite-energy states in quantum simulation platforms, which opens new possibilities for the study of phase transitions in 1D systems.

The recent study is a that combined the work of theoretical physicists at the University of Maryland with that of at the Duke Quantum Center, where the was placed and where the experiments were carried out.

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Researchers at the Ernst Strüngmann Institute in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, led by Wolf Singer, have made a new discovery in understanding fundamental brain processes. For the first time, the team has provided compelling evidence that the brain’s characteristic rhythmic patterns play a crucial role in information processing. While these oscillatory dynamics have long been observed in the brain, their purpose has remained mostly elusive until now.

The study has the potential to transform our understanding of brain activity. Using , the researchers show that recurrent networks with oscillating nodes demonstrate better performance compared to non-oscillating networks and replicate many experimentally observed phenomena.

These findings indicate that oscillatory dynamics are not just an epiphenomenon but are essential for efficient computation in the brain. The work is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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The largest solar storm in two decades hit Earth in May 2024. For several days, wave after wave of high-energy charged particles from the sun rocked the planet. Brilliant auroras engulfed the skies, and some GPS communications were temporarily disrupted.

With the help of a serendipitously resurrected small NASA satellite, scientists have discovered that this also created two new temporary belts of energetic particles encircling Earth. The findings are important to understanding how future solar storms could impact our technology.

The new belts formed between two others that permanently surround Earth called the Van Allen Belts. Shaped like high above Earth’s equator, these permanent belts are composed of a mix of high-energy electrons and protons that are trapped in place by Earth’s magnetic field. The energetic particles in these belts can damage spacecraft and imperil astronauts who pass through them, so understanding their dynamics is key to safe spaceflight.

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Researchers at the Sainsbury Wellcome Center (SWC) at UCL have unveiled the precise brain mechanisms that enable animals to overcome instinctive fears. Published in Science, the study in mice could have implications for developing therapeutics for fear-related disorders such as phobias, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The research team, led by Dr. Sara Mederos and Professor Sonja Hofer, mapped out how the brain learns to suppress responses to perceived threats that prove harmless over time.

“Humans are born with instinctive reactions, such as responses to loud noises or fast-approaching objects,” explains Dr. Mederos, Research Fellow in the Hofer Lab at SWC.

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Researchers at Tohoku University have achieved a significant advancement in opto-magnetic technology, observing an opto-magnetic torque approximately five times more efficient than in conventional magnets. This breakthrough, led by Koki Nukui, Assistant Professor Satoshi Iihama, and Professor Shigemi Mizukami, has far-reaching implications for the development of light-based spin memory and storage technologies.

Opto-magnetic is a method which can generate force on magnets. This can be used to change the direction of magnets by light more efficiently. By creating alloy nanofilms with up to 70% platinum dissolved in cobalt, the team discovered that the unique relativistic quantum mechanical effects of platinum significantly boost the magnetic torque.

The study revealed that the enhancement of opto-magnetic torque was attributed to the electron generated by circularly polarized light and relativistic quantum mechanical effects. The findings are published in Physical Review Letters.

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How does cold milk disperse when it is dripped into hot coffee? Even the fastest supercomputers are unable to perform the necessary calculations with high precision because the underlying quantum physical processes are extremely complex.

In 1982, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman suggested that, instead of using conventional computers, such questions are better solved using a quantum computer, which can simulate the quantum physical processes efficiently—a quantum simulator. With the rapid progress now being made in the development of quantum computers, Feynman’s vision could soon become a reality.

Together with researchers from Google and universities in five countries, Andreas Läuchli and Andreas Elben, two at PSI, have built and successfully tested a new type of digital–analog quantum simulator.

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Multiferroic materials, in which electric and magnetic properties are combined in promising ways, will be the heart of new solutions for data storage, data transmission, and quantum computers. Meanwhile, understanding the origin of such properties at a fundamental level is key for developing applications, and neutrons are the ideal probe.

Neutrons possess a which makes them sensitive to magnetic fields generated by unpaired electrons in materials. This makes scattering techniques a powerful tool to probe the magnetic behavior of materials at atomic level.

The story of the so-called layered perovskites and the breakthrough results now published are a paradigmatic example highlighting both the role of fundamental studies in the development of applications and of the power of neutrons. Being a promising class of materials exhibiting coupled magnetic and electric ordering properties at ambient temperatures, the magnetic structure of the layered perovskites YBaCuFeO5—and thus the origin of their interesting magneto-electric behavior—was still to be unambiguously determined.

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When humans kick swim through water, vortices form around their legs, generating the force that propels them forward. However, the mechanisms underlying variations in the structure of these vortices with swimming speed remain unclear.

In a new study published in Experiments in Fluids, researchers analyzed swimmer movement using an optical motion capture system and investigated vortex structure changes with varying speeds. They employed to visualize water flow dynamics.

Their results revealed that during underwater undulatory swimming, the vortex structure in the down-kick-to-up-kick transition phase changed as swimming speed increased. Specifically, with rising swimming speed, the direction of the jet flow between the two around the foot shifted to a more vertically downward orientation, a shift hypothesized to enhance forward propulsion during up-kicking.

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A new study reveals that short-term exposure to particulate matter (PM) air pollution can reduce a person’s ability to focus and interpret emotions, potentially making everyday tasks — like grocery shopping — more difficult.

Scientists found that even brief exposure to high levels of PM can impair concentration, increase distractibility, and affect social behavior.

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In the incident analyzed by the Canadian cybersecurity company, the initial access was gained to a targeted endpoint via a vulnerable SimpleHelp RMM instance (“194.76.227[.]171”) located in Estonia.

Upon establishing a remote connection, the threat actor has been observed performing a series of post-exploitation actions, including reconnaissance and discovery operations, as well as creating an administrator account named “sqladmin” to facilitate the deployment of the open-source Sliver framework.

The persistence offered by Sliver was subsequently abused to move laterally across the network, establishing a connection between the domain controller (DC) and the vulnerable SimpleHelp RMM client and ultimately installing a Cloudflare tunnel to stealthily route traffic to servers under the attacker’s control through the web infrastructure company’s infrastructure.

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