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Color-superconducting quark matter may explain stability of massive neutron stars

Describing matter under extreme conditions, such as those found inside neutron stars, remains an unsolved problem. The density of such matter is equivalent to compressing around 100,000 Eiffel Towers into a single cubic centimeter. In particular, the properties of so-called quark matter—which consists of the universe’s fundamental building blocks, the quarks, and may exist in extremely dense regions—play a central role.

Researchers from TU Darmstadt and Goethe University Frankfurt have studied this matter and its thermodynamic properties. Their findings are published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Theoretical studies suggest that quarks at very low temperatures enter a so-called color-superconducting state, which fundamentally alters the nature of matter. This state is analogous to the transition of an electron gas into an electrical superconductor—except that, instead of electrons, quarks pair up and create an energy gap in their excitation spectrum.

‘Ouzo effect’ reveals how oil droplets can resist flow and form stable patterns in liquids

Whether it’s Greek ouzo, French pastis or Turkish raki, when these spirits are diluted with water, the mixture becomes cloudy. The reason for this is that the aniseed oils contained in the spirit dissolve well in alcohol but not in water. The clear ouzo from the bottle has a high alcohol content at which the oil is fully soluble.

However, when water is added, the aniseed oils can no longer dissolve completely in the significantly reduced alcohol content. As a result, small droplets disperse finely in the drink, creating a milky appearance. Researchers at TU Darmstadt have now used this so-called ouzo effect to create oil droplets for a laboratory experiment. This led to a new discovery: such a droplet can resist a fluid flow and remain in place or even move upstream.

A 3D-printed Christmas tree made entirely of ice

A team of physicists from the University of Amsterdam’s Institute of Physics has 3D-printed a Christmas tree made entirely of ice. Researchers Menno Demmenie, Stefan Kooij and Daniel Bonn used no freezing technology or refrigeration equipment—just water and a vacuum. In time-lapse videos, you can see how the Christmas tree is printed and how it melts again when the vacuum pump is turned off. The work is published on the arXiv preprint server.

The secret of the tree lies in so-called evaporative cooling. This is the same principle mammals use to regulate their body temperature.

In a low-pressure vacuum chamber, water evaporates rapidly at room temperature. As each water molecule evaporates, it takes with it a small amount of heat, causing the remaining water to become increasingly colder, eventually cooling to below 0°C. At that point, the water is still liquid, but supercooled. As soon as the ultra-thin stream (about as thin as a human hair: 16 micrometers) hits the already formed layer of ice, it freezes instantly.

Subsystem resetting: Researchers discover a new route to control phase transitions in complex systems

Researchers in the Department of Theoretical Physics at Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai, have discovered that instead of manipulating every component or modifying interactions in a many-body system, occasionally resetting just a small fraction can reshape how the entire system behaves, including how it transitions from one phase to another.

This counterintuitive approach, called subsystem resetting, offers a powerful, universal control strategy to tune collective behavior in complex systems ranging from magnets to neural networks.

This work by Anish Acharya, Rupak Majumder, and Prof. Shamik Gupta has been published in Physical Review Letters.

Cisco Warns of Active Attacks Exploiting Unpatched 0-Day in AsyncOS Email Security Appliances

Cisco has alerted users to a maximum-severity zero-day flaw in Cisco AsyncOS software that has been actively exploited by a China-nexus advanced persistent threat (APT) actor codenamed UAT-9686 in attacks targeting Cisco Secure Email Gateway and Cisco Secure Email and Web Manager.

The networking equipment major said it became aware of the intrusion campaign on December 10, 2025, and that it has singled out a “limited subset of appliances” with certain ports open to the internet. It’s currently not known how many customers are affected.

“This attack allows the threat actors to execute arbitrary commands with root privileges on the underlying operating system of an affected appliance,” Cisco said in an advisory. “The ongoing investigation has revealed evidence of a persistence mechanism planted by the threat actors to maintain a degree of control over compromised appliances.”

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