News tagged with physics theory

Leading the quest to crack cosmological mysteries

Sometimes a scientist can only laugh in the face of a seemingly insurmountable challenge.

Physics / General Physics

created 45 minutes ago | popularity 3.7 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Rapunzel, Leonardo and the physics of the ponytail

(PhysOrg.com) -- New research provides the first mathematical understanding of the shape of a ponytail and could have implications for the textile industry, computer animation and personal care products.

Physics / General Physics

created 11 hours ago | popularity 4.4 / 5 (9) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

The perfect liquid -- now even more perfect

Ultra hot quark-gluon-plasma, generated by heavy-ion collisions in particle accelerators, is supposed to be the "most perfect fluid" in the world. Previous theories imposed a limit on how "liquid" fluids can ...

Physics / Plasma Physics

created Jan 17, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (10) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Physicists propose test for loop quantum gravity

(PhysOrg.com) -- As a quantum theory of gravity, loop quantum gravity could potentially solve one of the biggest problems in physics: reconciling general relativity and quantum mechanics. But like all tentative ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Jan 03, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (34) | comments 106 | with audio podcast feature

Pions don't want to decay into faster-than-light neutrinos, study finds

When an international collaboration of physicists came up with a result that punched a hole in Einstein's theory of special relativity and couldn't find any mistakes in their work, they asked the world to ...

Physics / General Physics

created Dec 23, 2011 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (35) | comments 170 | with audio podcast

U of Toronto experiment named top breakthrough of 2011 by Physics World

Aephraim Steinberg and colleagues at the Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control at the University of Toronto had the top physics breakthrough of the year according to Physics World magazine.

Physics / General Physics

created Dec 16, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 19

String theory researchers simulate big-bang on supercomputer

(PhysOrg.com) -- A trio of Japanese physicists have applied a reformulation of string theory, called IIB, whereby matrices are used to describe the properties of the physical universe, on a supercomputer, to effectively sho ...

Physics / General Physics

created Dec 14, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (24) | comments 75 | with audio podcast weblog

A new 'lens' for looking at quantum behavior

(PhysOrg.com) -- In a paper published in Physical Review Letters, researchers Daniel Terno (Macquarie University, Australia) and Radu Ionicioiu (Institute of Quantum Computing, Canada) provide a new perspe ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Dec 14, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (3) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

'Faster-than-light' particles spark science drama

Oh Albert. Did you get it wrong? In 2011, physics was shaken by an experiment which said the Universe's speed limit, enshrined by Einstein in his 1905 theory of special relativity, could be broken.

Physics / General Physics

created Dec 09, 2011 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (31) | comments 82

One clock with two times: When quantum mechanics meets general relativity

The unification of quantum mechanics and Einstein's general relativity is one of the most exciting and still open questions in modern physics. General relativity, the joint theory of gravity, space and time ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Oct 19, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (20) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Why Einstein was wrong about being wrong

If you want to get your mind around the research that won three astronomers the Nobel Prize in physics last week, it helps to think of the universe as a lump of dough - raisin-bread dough, to be precise - mixed, kneaded and ...

Physics / General Physics

created Oct 14, 2011 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (16) | comments 113

Shutdown looms at pioneering American atom smasher

(AP) -- Aside from the slogan on the water tower that reads "City of Energy," there is little in this leafy Chicago suburb of gently rolling hills to indicate that it has been the center of the universe when ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 28, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 1

3 Questions: Faster than light?

The news media were abuzz this week with reports of experiments conducted at the Gran Sasso particle detector complex in Italy, apparently showing subatomic particles called neutrinos had traveled from th ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 26, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (15) | comments 68

Challenging Einstein is usually a losing venture

(AP) -- Betting against Einstein and his theory of relativity is a way to go broke. For more than a century, everyone from physicists to the Nazi Party - which encouraged the publication of the tract "One ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 23, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (18) | comments 27

Gee Whizzz! Basics on faster-than-light research

Some questions and answers about the experiment that appeared to show particles speeding faster than light.

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 23, 2011 | popularity 4.1 / 5 (8) | comments 19