Scientists use quantum entangled light for a new form of microscopy able to detect signals normally hidden by quantum noise. The Science Lasers are often used to look at objects in microscopes. But even the best laser has “quantum noise” that makes a picture blurry and hides the details. This in turn results in measurements that are less precise than scientists need. Researchers have designed a new type of microscope that uses squeezed light to reduce measurement uncertainty. Unlike today’s…
The improvement of spectroscopy measurements. Several years ago, physicists from the Centre for Quantum Optical Technologies and the Faculty of Physics of the University of Warsaw designed and built the first quantum memory in Poland, which was further developed into a quantum processor. “Our processor is based on a cloud of cold atoms. They can efficiently store and process information from light,” describes Dr Michal Parniak, leader of the Quantum-Optical Devices Laboratory. In an article recently published in “Nature Communications”,…
Research team from the University of Tübingen encounters new type of star with unusual properties – possibly two white dwarfs which have merged. Astronomers from the Universities of Tübingen and Potsdam have discovered a new type of star. While hunting for “hot stars” with the Large Binocular Telescope in Arizona, the team came across stars with unusual properties. While normal stellar surfaces are composed of hydrogen and helium, these stars, found under the direction of Professor Klaus Werner of the…
Atoms form a kagome pattern A kagome pattern is composed of three shifted regular triangular lattices. As a result, the kagome lattice is a regular pattern composed of stars of David. It is a common Japanese basket pattern which is where its name derives from. In condensed matter physics, materials crystallizing in a kagome lattice have first gained significant attention in the early 90’s. Until 2018, when FeSn as the first kagome metal was found, correlated electronic states in kagome…
New world record: KATRIN experiment limits neutrino mass with unprecedented precision. Neutrinos are arguably the most fascinating elementary particle in our universe. In cosmology they play an important role in the formation of large-scale structures, while in particle physics their tiny but non-zero mass sets them apart, pointing to new physics phenomena beyond our current theories. Without a measurement of the mass scale of neutrinos our understanding of the universe will remain incomplete. This is the challenge the international KATRIN…
Scientists discover that triggering superconductivity with a flash of light involves the same fundamental physics that are at work in the more stable states needed for devices, opening a new path toward producing room-temperature superconductivity. Much like people can learn more about themselves by stepping outside of their comfort zones, researchers can learn more about a system by giving it a jolt that makes it a little unstable – scientists call this “out of equilibrium” – and watching what happens…
New study confirms decades of indirect evidence for debris from disintegrating planets hurtling into white dwarfs across the galaxy University of Warwick sees X-rays from planetary debris heated to a million degrees as it falls onto the dead core of its host star The moment that debris from destroyed planets impacts the surface of a white dwarf star has been observed for the first time by astronomers at the University of Warwick. They have used X-rays to detect the rocky…
The energy transport between atoms and molecules is the basis of all life. Such transport is based on interatomic forces known as the dipole-dipole interaction. Prof. Dr Herwig Ott’s research group at Technische Universität Kaiserslautern (TUK) has now succeeded in reproducing such a transport mechanism in a disordered system. For this purpose, the researchers experimentally observed the quantum mechanical interaction between different Rydberg atoms. This allowed them to understand the influence of disorder on the distribution and mobility of the…
Magnetometers measure the direction, strength or relative changes of magnetic fields, at a specific point in space and time. Employed in many research areas, magnetometers can help doctors to see the brain through medical imaging, or archaeologists to reveal underground treasures without excavating the ground. Some magnetic fields of great interest, for example those produced by the brain, are extraordinarily weak, a billion times weaker than the field of the Earth, and therefore, extremely sensitive magnetometers are required to detect…
Researchers from the Cavendish Laboratory have modelled a quantum walk of identical particles that can change their fundamental character by simply hopping across a domain wall in a one-dimensional lattice. Their findings, published as a Letter in Physical Review Research, open up a window to engineer and control new kinds of collective motion in the quantum world. All known fundamental particles fall in two groups: either a fermion (“matter particle”) or a boson (“force carrier”), depending on how their state…
European joint experiment prepares transition to large-scale ITER project. European scientists have achieved a major success on the road to energy production through fusion plasmas: They produced stable plasmas with 59 megajoules of energy output at the world’s largest fusion facility, JET, in Culham near Oxford, UK. The team, which also includes researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP), used the fuel of future fusion power plants. These were the first experiments of their kind in the…
Whether for use in cybersecurity, gaming or scientific simulation, the world needs true random numbers, but generating them is harder than one might think. But a group of Brown University physicists has developed a technique that can potentially generate millions of random digits per second by harnessing the behavior of skyrmions — tiny magnetic anomalies that arise in certain two-dimensional materials. Their research, published in Nature Communications, reveals previously unexplored dynamics of single skyrmions, the researchers say. Discovered around a…
Largest-ever simulations suggest flickering powered by magnetic ‘reconnection’. Researchers at the Flatiron Institute and their collaborators found that breaking and reconnecting magnetic field lines near the event horizon release energy from a black hole’s magnetic field, accelerating particles that generate intense flares. Black holes aren’t always in the dark. Astronomers have spotted intense light shows shining from just outside the event horizon of supermassive black holes, including the one at our galaxy’s core. However, scientists couldn’t identify the cause of…
Exoplanets come in shapes and sizes that are not found in our solar system. These include small gaseous planets called mini-Neptunes and rocky planets several times Earth’s mass called super-Earths. Now, astronomers have identified two different cases of “mini-Neptune” planets that are losing their puffy atmospheres and likely transforming into super-Earths. Radiation from the planets’ stars is stripping away their atmospheres, driving the hot gas to escape like steam from a pot of boiling water. The new findings help paint a…
Study by the University of Bonn and the TU Darmstadt suggests errors in the interpretation of older measurements. A few years ago, a novel measurement technique showed that protons are probably smaller than had been assumed since the 1990s. The discrepancy surprised the scientific community; some researchers even believed that the Standard Model of particle physics would have to be changed. Physicists at the University of Bonn and the Technical University of Darmstadt have now developed a method that allows…
When non-uniform force is applied to a material, it exhibits spontaneous electrical polarization induced by a strain gradient. This phenomenon is called flexoelectricity. There is no need to apply an electric field when utilizing this property and therefore, it shows promising device applications in smartphones, generators, and actuators. Recently, a Korean research team has developed a method to control the flexoelectricity of nanometer-sized (one-billionth of a meter) materials by pressing with the AFM tip. A joint team of researchers led…
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