Researchers from the MPIK in Heidelberg used an atomic gas as a time-dependent lens to shape and spectrally manipulate intense high-frequency laser pulses. This gas-based optical element could pave the way toward better XUV- and X-ray pulse control for applications such as chemical reaction steering, quantum computing, and advanced spectroscopy methods for fundamental science. The paper is published in the journal Science Advances.
Researchers at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering and the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, headquartered at Florida State University, have designed a new quantum computing architecture that uses magnetic levitation to smooth over design flaws in the intricate components necessary to run a quantum computer.
Quantum bits, or qubits, can be as small as a few nanometers, and manufacturing them inevitably introduces random flaws on their surfaces. By using superconducting magnets to levitate neon particles, the research addresses a challenge in electron-on-neon qubit devices: the tendency for electrons to become trapped by tiny random bumps on the neon surface, making them function unpredictably.
The study, published in PRX Quantum, could help pave the way for more reproducible and scalable quantum computing technologies.
Is the universe as stable as we think it is? That’s one of the big questions that particle physicists worldwide are preparing to answer with the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC—the world’s most powerful particle accelerator—when its upgrade is completed in about four years. In the meantime, researchers, including a cohort at the University of Michigan, are working to sharpen their analytical tools and techniques to make the most of the LHC’s current and future data.
A team including U-M physicists has now reported record-setting sensitivity in spotting a specific interaction within the LHC’s data that may help answer fundamental questions about our universe. In particular, the analysis uses an advanced AI algorithm to spot signatures researchers are looking for to understand how the Higgs boson, the famous fundamental particle that helps explain how subatomic particles have mass, interacts with itself.
“This analysis is the most sensitive in the world to this specific physics,” said Greg Myers, a research fellow in the U-M Department of Physics.
Electronic fluctuations can act as a resonant bridge between normally separate crystal vibrations, offering a new route to study and control ferroaxial quantum states.
Symmetry is a basic rule of the natural world. It explains why some objects appear the same after they are rotated, reflected, or changed in other ways. In materials, symmetry helps determine how atoms and electrons are positioned and how they move together. It can also block certain collective atomic motions (vibrations) from interacting, meaning some motions are normally unable to influence one another. But a new study asks whether those limits are always fixed.
A study published in Nature Physics suggests that some of these restrictions can be loosened. Researchers from the University of Texas at Austin and the Max Planck Institute for the Structure and Dynamics of Matter (MPSD) in Hamburg found that electronic fluctuations can create a dynamic connection between vibrations that symmetry would usually keep apart. Led by Edoardo Baldini’s group at UT Austin, the work shows how light, vibrations, and electrons can become linked inside a ferroaxial crystal, a special material that may offer new ways to control quantum states with light.
A mysterious object dubbed Phoebe may be a primordial black hole from the early universe, detected only because it briefly magnified the light of a distant star.
On the night of 18 December 2019, a star in our satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud, briefly got brighter. Not dramatically nor explosively, just a smooth, symmetrical rise and fall in brightness lasting about an hour, as though something had passed in front of it and bent its light toward us. Then it returned to normal and was never seen to vary again.
That something has been named Phoebe. And working out what it actually is turns out to be one of the most intriguing puzzles in modern astronomy. The phenomenon at the heart of the story is called gravitational microlensing, and it’s one of the most elegant predictions of Einstein’s general theory of relativity.
ADHD-related attention patterns may become a source of creativity and focus when supported through structured creative expression.
How can ADHD create serious everyday challenges for millions of people while also appearing among highly successful creative figures such as Justin Timberlake and Simone Biles?
New research from Constructor University neuroscientist Dr. Radwa Khalil, published in iScience, examines the neuroscience behind that apparent contradiction by looking at how creativity and attention are connected in the brain.
Three distinct suspected Russian cyber espionage threat clusters have been observed leveraging legitimate authentication flows to single out individuals working in academia, aerospace and defense, governments, and think tanks across Europe, as well as academia and think tanks within the U.S.
These clusters include UNC6293, UNC7005, and UNC5976.
“These clusters engage in persistent, adaptive phishing campaigns, using sophisticated social engineering tactics to compromise personal accounts across multiple platforms,” Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) researchers Gabby Roncone and Wesley Shields said in a report published today.
Adversa says encrypted prompt injection can make Grok send a user’s name, location, tier, and chat prompts to an attacker-controlled server.
