Physics

Electric vehicles promise to help wean us off of fossil fuels, but they introduce a new problem: how to get enough of the lithium that EV batteries require (SN: 5/7/19). Materials scientist Chong Liu of the University of Chicago has some ideas. Existing technology can extract lithium only from sources with highly concentrated ions, like […]

Picture Victorian London, but its skies are filled with airships. Steam-powered robots crowd the streets, mingling with people in top hats and petticoats. That type of retrofuturistic mash-up is the fantasy realm of steampunk, a genre of literature, film and other creative media. Theoretical physicist Nicole Yunger Halpern sees her specialty, the field of quantum […]

It’s the rarest particle decay ever discovered. Scientists have clinched the case for a special type of decay of subatomic particles called kaons. Further study of the rare decay could reveal a potential flaw in the standard model, physicists’ stalwart theory of subatomic particles. The decay is known as a “golden channel” because its rate […]

Extreme Climate Survey Scientific news is collecting questions from readers about how to navigate our planet’s changing climate. What do you want to know about extreme heat and how it can lead to extreme weather events? Now, scientists have performed repeated rounds of operations and error correction on eight logical qubits, researchers from Microsoft and […]

Extreme Climate Survey Scientific news is collecting questions from readers about how to navigate our planet’s changing climate. What do you want to know about extreme heat and how it can lead to extreme weather events? Standard computers rely on electricity, using wires to transmit data via electrical currents. Photonic computers rely on light in […]