Researchers observe an effect in the quantum world that does not exist in the macrocosm. Many substances change their properties when they are cooled below a certain critical temperature. Such a phase transition occurs, for example, when water freezes. However, in certain metals there are phase transitions that do not exist in the macrocosm. They arise because of the special laws of quantum mechanics that apply in the realm of nature’s smallest building blocks. It is thought that the concept…

Advancements in photonic memory for faster optical computing. In a breakthrough for optical computing, researchers developed a nanosecond-scale volatile modulation scheme integrating a phase-change material. Technological advancements like autonomous driving and computer vision are driving a surge in demand for computational power. Optical computing, with its high throughput, energy efficiency, and low latency, has garnered considerable attention from academia and industry. However, current optical computing chips face limitations in power consumption and size, which hinders the scalability of optical computing…

Researchers from TU Darmstadt and ESA present a new method. More and more artificial objects are orbiting the Earth. Apart from satellites essential for communication, research, or navigation, most others are unwelcome and pose an operational risk because they increase the probability of collisions. Preventing these requires efficient algorithms to identify objects that are getting dangerously close to each other, researchers at TU Darmstadt and the European Space Agency (ESA) now present two new approaches. In 1957, the first satellite…

Quantum key successfully distributed between two points with combination of free-space and fiber links. Researchers from Jena, Berlin, Erlangen-Nuremberg and Wessling have successfully distributed quantum keys between two points using a combination of free-space and fiber links under everyday conditions. On a heterogeneous test bed in Jena, they achieved key rates in the kilobit range per second in daylight. The experiment was implemented as part of the QuNET initiative, a pilot project funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education…

Topology plays an enormous role in modern condensed matter physics and beyond. It describes how solid materials can combine two very different and somewhat contradictory properties – for example, topological insulators are materials whose bulk acts as an insulator, but whose surfaces and edges can conduct electricity nonetheless. In the last few decades, the concept of topology has changed the way scientists think of electronic structure and material properties altogether. Moreover, it has paved the way towards technological applications that…

They are mysterious, exciting and inescapable – black holes are some of the most exotic objects in the Universe. With gravitational-wave detectors, it is possible to detect the chirp sound that two black holes produce when they merge, approximately 70 such chirps have been found so far. A team of researchers at the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies (HITS) now predicts that in this “ocean of voices” chirps preferentially occur in two universal frequency ranges. The study has been published…

Researchers used an innovative machine learning approach to develop a tiny model capable of running on a satellite’s limited processing power; The trained model successfully detected cloud cover in satellite images in around a tenth of a second; The model could easily be adapted to enable automated decision making for a range of purposes, from disaster management to deforestation. For the first time, a project led by the University of Oxford has trained a machine learning model in outer space,…

Hydrogen peroxide detected at Ganymede’s poles; sulfur monoxide from Io’s volcanos. With its sensitive infrared cameras and high-resolution spectrometer, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is revealing new secrets of Jupiter’s Galilean satellites, in particular Ganymede, the largest moon, and Io, the most volcanically active. In two separate publications, astronomers who are part of JWST’s Early Release Science program report the first detection of hydrogen peroxide on Ganymede and sulfurous fumes on Io, both the result of Jupiter’s domineering influence….

This is the main conclusion of a study led by the ICM-CSIC recently published in the prestigious journal Science Robotics. A team led by the Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM-CSIC) in Barcelona in collaboration with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) in Califòrnia, the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and the Universitat de Girona (UdG), proves for the first time that reinforcement learning -i.e., a neural network that learns the best action to perform at each moment based…

International team reports on a radio pulsar phase of a Galactic magnetar that emitted a fast radio burst in 2020; observations suggest unique origins for “bursts” and “pulses,” which adds to FRB formation theory. More than 15 years after the discovery of fast radio bursts (FRBs) – millisecond-long, deep-space cosmic explosions of electromagnetic radiation – astronomers worldwide have been combing the universe to uncover clues about how and why they form. Nearly all FRBs identified have originated in deep space…

Using ultra-high-precision laser spectroscopy on a simple molecule, a group of physicists led by Professor Stephan Schiller Ph.D. from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) has measured the wave-like vibration of atomic nuclei with an unprecedented level of precision. In the scientific journal Nature Physics, the physicists report that they can thus confirm the wave-like movement of nuclear material more precisely that ever before and that they have found no evidence of any deviation from the established force between atomic nuclei….

KIT researchers use deep learning for non-invasive localization of ventricular extrasystoles. Worldwide, cardiovascular diseases cause more than 17 million deaths per year. Of these, about 25 percent are deemed sudden cardiac deaths. They may be caused by ventricular tachycardias, i.e. quick cardiac dysrhythmias from the ventricles that are frequently caused by ventricular extrasystoles. These additional heartbeats from the heart chambers feel like skipped heartbeats. Normal heartbeat is controlled by the sino-atrial node in the left atrium. Extrasystoles, by contrast, are…

A young planet whirling around a petulant red dwarf star is changing in unpredictable ways orbit-by-orbit. It is so close to its parent star that it experiences a consistent, torrential blast of energy, which evaporates its hydrogen atmosphere – causing it to puff off the planet. But during one orbit observed with NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, the planet looked like it wasn’t losing any material at all, while an orbit observed with Hubble a year and a half later showed clear…

Göttingen research team explores information processing in Deep Neural Networks. Artificial neural networks are everywhere in research and technology, as well as in everyday technologies such as speech recognition. Despite this, it is still unclear to researchers what is exactly going on deep down in these networks. To find out, researchers at the Göttingen Campus Institute for Dynamics of Biological Networks (CIDBN) at Göttingen University, and the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organisation (MPI-DS) have carried out an information-theoretic…

Researchers at Leipzig University have developed a highly efficient method to investigate systems with long-range interactions that were previously puzzling to experts. These systems can be gases or even solid materials such as magnets whose atoms interact not only with their neighbours but also far beyond. Professor Wolfhard Janke and his team of researchers use Monte Carlo computer simulations for this purpose. This stochastic process, named after the Monte Carlo casino, generates random system states from which the desired properties…

Researchers devise an approach to vastly enhance the near-infrared absorption in silicon, which could lead to affordable, high-performance photonic devices. Photonic systems are quickly gaining traction in many emerging applications, including optical communications, lidar sensing, and medical imaging. However, the widespread adoption of photonics in future engineering solutions hinges on the cost of manufacturing photodetectors, which, in turn, largely depends on the kind of semiconductor utilized for the purpose. Traditionally, silicon (Si) has been the most prevalent semiconductor in the…