{"id":246106,"date":"2026-10-29T05:58:34","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T10:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/10\/against-all-expectations-researchers-control-the-magnetic-core-of-a-single-atom"},"modified":"2026-10-29T05:58:34","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T10:58:34","slug":"against-all-expectations-researchers-control-the-magnetic-core-of-a-single-atom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/10\/against-all-expectations-researchers-control-the-magnetic-core-of-a-single-atom","title":{"rendered":"Against all expectations, researchers control the magnetic core of a single atom"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Researchers at Delft University of Technology (the Netherlands) have succeeded in controlling the magnetism in the nucleus of a single atom with radio waves. This came as a surprise: until now, physicists believed that this nuclear spin could not be manipulated directly. The discovery could open up new possibilities for storing and reading quantum information. The research is published<\/a> in the journal Nature Communications.<\/p>\n

In metals such as iron and nickel, every atom is slightly magnetic. But inside the atom, different magnetic \u201ccompass needles,\u201d known in quantum mechanics as spins, are also at work. \u201cBy far the strongest magnetism comes from the electrons,\u201d says lead researcher Sander Otte. \u201cBut in some atoms, the nucleus also carries a spin. That spin is much weaker, but it is also much better shielded from the outside world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Otte\u2019s group studies spins using a converted scanning tunneling microscope. This enables electrical signals to be directed with extreme precision at a single atom. In the past, the researchers mainly focused on the electron spin, which is the easiest to read out. The nuclear spin appeared only indirectly, through the so-called hyperfine interaction. This causes the spins of the nucleus and the electron to become slightly entangled.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Researchers at Delft University of Technology (the Netherlands) have succeeded in controlling the magnetism in the nucleus of a single atom with radio waves. This came as a surprise: until now, physicists believed that this nuclear spin could not be manipulated directly. The discovery could open up new possibilities for storing and reading quantum information. [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,1617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-246106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-particle-physics","category-quantum-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246106\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}