Phys.org news

Phys.org / Sudden quantum jolts may not break adiabatic behavior after all

In thermodynamics, an "adiabatic process" is a system change that transfers no heat in or out of the system. Any and all energy change in that system are therefore accomplished by doing work on the system, work being action ...

8 hours ago
Phys.org / A lost galaxy called 'Loki' may be hiding inside the Milky Way

The Milky Way galaxy grew into its current form with the help of smaller galaxies over time, which it has "consumed" or merged with. Astronomers are able to pick out which stars in the Milky Way came from other galaxies by ...

10 hours ago
Phys.org / Evolution has reused the same genes for 120 million years, study shows

Scientists have shown that evolution has been using the same genetic "cheat sheet" for over 120 million years, suggesting that life on Earth may be more predictable than first imagined. The international team, led by scientists ...

9 hours ago
Phys.org / In good spirits: Why haunted houses are perfect places to connect with others

A pounding heart, shaking limbs, chills and a churning stomach—it's no wonder that fear is an emotion we usually try to avoid. At least most of the time. We may not like having the wits scared out of us in a real-life crisis, ...

9 hours ago
Phys.org / Frozen-in gravity: A new way to understand the evolution of spacetime dynamics

The concept of spacetime, first described in Einstein's theory of general relativity, has since been widely studied by many physicists worldwide. Spacetime is described mathematically as a four-dimensional (4D) continuum ...

15 hours ago
Phys.org / A physics explanation shows why US elections keep ending 50:50—and why more spending won't change that

A physics-inspired model calibrated on 40 years of US congressional data pinpoints a spending threshold of roughly 1.8 million USD at which campaigns stop influencing who wins and start fueling polarization instead.

11 hours ago
Phys.org / How temperature swings impact the growth of young songbirds

Climate change threatens to cause increasingly extreme and variable temperature swings, affecting everything from urban infrastructure to global food supplies. In the animal kingdom, the hardest hit may be the youngest and ...

4 hours ago
Phys.org / A silent robot shadows sperm whales by listening to their clicks

An autonomous underwater glider is giving us a new and effective way to track sperm whales by tuning into their clicks and silently following them. To study these large oceanic predators, researchers need to monitor their ...

12 hours ago
Phys.org / Room-temperature multiferroic could pave way to low-energy computing

A team of researchers at Rice University has engineered a new version of a well-known multiferroic that exhibits orders of magnitude higher performance at room temperature than its parent material. The study, published in ...

13 hours ago
Phys.org / Human cell map uncovers 90,000 interactions among 4 million gene pairs

How do our genes determine our appearance and our susceptibility to disease? This question is central to biomedical research, and today we can sequence thousands of human genomes to identify these genes. However, genes work ...

7 hours ago
Phys.org / Measurement of nuclear reactions at record-low energies opens new pathways for astrophysics research

An international research team has achieved an important milestone for astrophysics at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt: In the CRYRING@ESR storage ring, scientists were able to measure nuclear reactions at extremely low energies for ...

6 hours ago
Phys.org / Twisting water reveals hidden order across four molecular layers at air-water interface

Researchers from the Department of Physical Chemistry at the Fritz Haber Institute and Freie Universität Berlin have revealed the arrangement of water molecules at the interface between liquid water and air. Their findings ...

3 hours ago