http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (PhysOrg.com) -- Random lasing, Robin Kaiser tells PhysOrg.com, is like standard lasing, with a little bit of a twist: `You don`t know the direction the photons will go, as you do with a more standard laser. This is because the feedback normally produced by a cavity, which sets a propagation axis, is now provided by multiple scattering in all directions. Light is randomly scattered throughout the structure of the laser, exciting further light-emitting processes. Light in a random laser does not come out in a precise direction; it comes out in all directions.` http://www.physorg.com/news161863563.html Physics Mon, 18 May 2009 11:06:44 EST news161863563 (PhysOrg.com) -- When studying cold atoms, scientists often use magnetic or optical traps to keep the atoms in place. However, in some cases experimentalists want to study free atoms, avoiding the effects of a trap. "One way to study free atoms," Cass Sackett tells PhysOrg.com, "is by bouncing them off a surface... most of the time, the atoms are free." He says that scientists have been interested in bouncing atoms for a long time, but that before now only about five bounces have been achieved. "Using magnets and certain lasers, it is possible to bounce atoms. However, they are lost relatively quickly." http://www.physorg.com/news160053848.html Physics Mon, 27 Apr 2009 12:24:47 EST news160053848 (PhysOrg.com) -- The most accurate timekeepers in the world are atomic clocks, which tell time based on the absorption of a very specific and unchanging microwave frequency, which induces electrons in an atom to `jump` from one particular energy level to another. But to improve atomic clocks further, a new basis is needed. http://www.physorg.com/news159624756.html Physics Wed, 22 Apr 2009 13:13:10 EST news159624756 A clock that is so precise that it loses only a second every 300 million years - this is the result of new research in ultra cold atoms. The international collaboration is comprised of researchers from the University of Colorado, USA and the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen and the results have just been published in the prestigious scientific journal, Science. http://www.physorg.com/news159111429.html Physics Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:37:36 EST news159111429