Lisa Zyga

(Phys.org) —Although the curves and ripples of spacetime are suspected to be full of intriguing secrets about the history of the universe, they are also extremely difficult to study. For this reason, some physicists are turning ...

(Phys.org) —Liquid crystals are widely known for their use in LCD TVs, in which quickly changing electrical fields are used to control the molecular order of the liquid crystals. This in turn changes how light is transmitted ...

The origins of language is, in some ways, more complicated to study than the origins of other biological traits because language does not fossilize or leave behind physical traces the way that bones and tissues do. However, ...

(Phys.org) —No two biological cells are exactly the same. Even a small biopsied tumor sample contains cells with large variations in their proliferation rate, potential for metastasis, drug responsiveness, etc. However, because ...

(Phys.org) —For the past few decades, physicists have been studying the phenomenon of "twisted light," which is light that is twisted like a corkscrew along its axis of travel. Due to the twisting, the light waves at the ...

(Phys.org) —What happens when you shoot multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) out of a gun onto an aluminum target at a velocity of more than 15,000 mph? Scientists finally have the answer. If a nanotube reaches the target ...

(Phys.org) —Since 1916, general relativity has provided a description of gravity that can explain many observations, including objects in free fall, gravitational lensing by massive objects, and black holes. Despite the success ...

(Phys.org) —Cooling microscopic objects to temperatures near absolute zero requires unconventional refrigeration technologies. One microscale cooling method is superconducting refrigeration, in which refrigerators extract ...

(Phys.org) —Today's commercial flash memories usually store data as electric charge in polysilicon layers. Because polysilicon is a single continuous material, defects in the material can interfere with the desired charge ...

(Phys.org) —Genetic engineering is one of the great achievements of modern science, allowing for the insertion or deletion of genes in order to control an organism's characteristics and behaviors. However, genetic engineering ...

(Phys.org) —Sometimes mathematical theories have implications that extend far beyond their original purpose. This situation holds true for the four-color theorem, which was originally used by cartographers hundreds of years ...

(Phys.org) —Humans have a strong tendency to belong to a group, an instinct that often manifests in herding behavior. Not limited to humans, herding exists throughout nature, for example in ant colonies, schools of fish, ...

(Phys.org) —Physicists are continually looking for ways to unify the theory of relativity, which describes large-scale phenomena, with quantum theory, which describes small-scale phenomena. In a new proposed experiment in ...

(Phys.org) —If the recently released Google Glass and soon-to-be-available Apple iWatch are any indication, wearable electronics may be the next big wave of the future. Although they offer some cutting-edge features, from ...

(Phys.org) —As silicon-based electronics are predicted to reach their absolute limits on performance around 2020, new technologies have been proposed to continue the trend in the miniaturization of electronic devices. One ...