Physics
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Quantum Physics
Galileo’s famous gravity experiment holds up, even with individual atoms
When dropped, two types of atoms accelerate at the same rate despite their differences, much like objects in Galileo’s leaning Tower of Pisa experiment.
- Physics
A photon’s journey through a hydrogen molecule is the shortest event ever timed
The shortest duration ever measured is 247 zeptoseconds, or trillionths of a billionth of a second.
- Animals
The diabolical ironclad beetle can survive getting run over by a car. Here’s how
The diabolical ironclad beetle is an incredibly tough little creature. A peek inside its exoskeleton reveals what makes it virtually uncrushable.
- Physics
The first room-temperature superconductor has finally been found
A compound of carbon, hydrogen and sulfur conducts electricity without resistance up to 15° C, but there’s a catch: It works only under high pressure.
- Physics
Fundamental constants place a new speed limit on sound
Physicists propose a new maximum rate that sound waves can travel under conditions normally found on Earth — 36 kilometers per second.
- Physics
Black hole revelations win the 2020 Nobel Prize in physics
The Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to a trio of scientists for their work on the most mysterious objects in the universe: black holes.
- Tech
A new thermometer measures temperature with sound
An acoustic thermometer takes temperature by listening to the faint hum that objects give off when they get hot.
- Space
The first black hole image helped test general relativity in a new way
The Event Horizon Telescope’s iconic image of the black hole at the center of galaxy M87 once again shows Einstein was right.
- Physics
A stop-motion experiment reveals supercooled water’s dual nature
Scientists found signs that water cooled well below freezing consists of two different arrangements of molecules.
- Space
EHT data show turbulence makes the glowing ring around M87’s black hole wobble
Event Horizon Telescope data spanning nearly a decade reveal that the appearance of the supermassive black hole inside galaxy M87 changes over time.
- Animals
Sea butterflies’ shells determine how the snails swim
New aquarium videos show that sea butterflies of various shapes and sizes flutter through water differently.
- Physics
Toy boats float upside down underneath a layer of levitated liquid
The upward force of buoyancy keeps objects afloat even in unusual conditions.
