Physics and Matter News - August 2009 Archives
 | Method may help identify conditions needed to get current flowing at higher temperatures ...> Full Article |
 | We Americans take the electric current behind our power buttons for granted, and assume the juice will be there when we need it. Will it? DHS S&T is funding a superconductor technology that will make sure it is. ...> Full Article |
If you are curious about the potential of quantum computing, you will want to keep your eye on "Harnessing Quantum Physics." This is one of many panel discussions coming your way as part of the Quantum to Cosmos Festival, running on-site, online and on TV from October 15-25, 2009.
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 | Scientists are trying to figure out to what extent a new theory of quantum gravity will reproduce general relativity. ...> Full Article |
Despite their popularity in the science fiction genre, there is much to be learned about black holes. In a paper published in the August 20 issue of Physical Review Letters, the flagship journal of the American Physical Society, Dartmouth researchers propose a new way of creating a reproduction black hole in the laboratory on a much-tinier scale than their celestial counterparts.
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 | Researchers are adapting the same methods used in fusion-energy research to create extremely thin plasma beams for a new class of "nanolithography" required to make future computer chips. ...> Full Article |
 | Old methods lead to a new approach to finding a quantum theory of gravity ...> Full Article |
 | University of Utah mathematicians developed a new cloaking method, and it's unlikely to lead to invisibility cloaks like those used by Harry Potter or Romulan spaceships in "Star Trek." Instead, the new method someday might shield submarines from sonar, planes from radar, buildings from earthquakes, and oil rigs and coastal structures from tsunamis. ...> Full Article |
 | A special three-day symposium focusing on the neutrino, a strange subatomic particle that could help answer some of the universe's most compelling questions, is scheduled for Aug. 16-18 at the 238th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in Washington, D.C. ...> Full Article |
 | NIST physicists have improved an experimental atomic clock based on ytterbium atoms, which now about four times more accurate than it was several years ago, giving it a precision comparable to that of the NIST-F1 cesium fountain clock. ...> Full Article |
 | Tel Aviv University researcher stays one step ahead of new threats to online security ...> Full Article |
The University of Toronto will host the world's leading scientists in physics, chemistry, computer science and mathematics to review major advances in quantum information and quantum control during a conference running Aug. 24-27.
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While the researchers can't promise delivery to a parallel universe or a school for wizards, books like Pullman's Dark Materials and JK Rowling's Harry Potter are steps closer to reality now that researchers in China have created the first tunable electromagnetic gateway.
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 | Scientists at UC Santa Barbara have devised a new type of superconducting circuit that behaves quantum mechanically ?? but has up to five levels of energy instead of the usual two. The findings are published in the Aug. 7 issue of Science. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists have measured the largest effect of the "weak interaction" -- one of the four fundamental forces of nature -- ever observed in an atom. ...> Full Article |
CERN 's Large Hadron Collider will initially run at an energy of 3.5 TeV per beam when it starts up in November this year. This news comes after all tests on the machine's high-current electrical connections were completed last week, indicating that no further repairs are necessary for safe running.
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Scientists at the University of Liverpool are constructing highly sensitive detectors as part of an international project to understand the elements that make up the universe.
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In the classic fairy tale, "The Emperor's New Clothes," Hans Christian Andersen uses the eyes of a child to challenge conventional wisdom and help others to see more clearly. In similar fashion, researchers at the University of Illinois have now revealed the naked truth about a classic bell-shaped curve used to describe the motion of a liquid as it diffuses through another material.
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New research on random packing could mean big advance for industry
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 | A recently discovered hydrogen-based compound could be helpful in the search for metallic and superconducting forms of hydrogen. ...> Full Article |
A well-established physical law describes the transfer of heat between two objects, but some physicists have long predicted that the law should break down when the objects are very close together. Scientists had never been able to confirm, or measure, this breakdown in practice. For the first time, however, MIT researchers have achieved this feat, and determined that the heat transfer can be 1,000 times greater than the law predicts.
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 | Boston College discovery bends light around corners, along Eastern seaboard ...> Full Article |
A team of physicists from the Universities of Cambridge and Birmingham have shown that electrons in narrow wires can divide into two new particles called spinons and a holons.
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New species of ancient crocodile discovered
Kitchen gadget inspires scientist to make more effective plastic electronics
Making memories last
Ferroelectric switching discovered for first time in soft biological tissue
Forensic research extends detection of cyanide poisoning
The wild early lives of today's most massive galaxies
What really happened prior to 'Snowball Earth'?
Shakespeare's skill 'more in grammar than in words'
Detailed picture of how myoV 'walks' along actin tracks
Need muscle for a tough spot? Turn to fat stem cells
Earth's energy budget remained out of balance despite unusually low solar activity
Pictures of food create feelings of hunger
Mighty mesh
Sweeten up your profits with the right hybrid
Patterns of antibiotic-resistant bacteria found in Galapagos reptiles
Bilayer graphene works as an insulator
Patterns of chromosome abnormality: The key to cancer?
Advantages of living in the dark: The multiple evolution events of 'blind' cavefish
Snakes improve search-and-rescue robots
Enhancing cognition in older adults also changes personality
Magnetic actuation enables nanoscale thermal analysis
A new artificial intelligence technique to speed the planning of tasks when resources are limited
'Tiger mothers' should tame parenting approach
Film coatings made from whey
Growing US violent extremism by the numbers
If a fat tax is coming, here's how to make it efficient, effective
Bobsled runs -- fast and yet safe
Fruit fly intestine may hold secret to the fountain of youth
Bright lights of purity
How seawater could corrode nuclear fuel
Does antimatter weigh more, less or the same as matter?
Scientists create first atomic X-ray laser
Jupiter's 'Trojans' on an atomic scale
World's longest superconductor cable