Viewpoint: Keeping One Step Ahead of Errors
Updated: 2012-04-30 14:00:00
Statistical mechanical models are the key to understanding the performance of error correction in topological quantum computers. Published Mon Apr 30, 2012
Viewpoint: A Walk Along the Dripline
Updated: 2012-04-30 14:00:00Measurements of radioactive, neutron-rich isotopes of argon are paving the way for experiments at new facilities that will explore the neutron dripline. Published Mon Apr 30, 2012What Is The Large Hadron Collider?
Updated: 2012-04-30 12:14:24
Most of all, the LHC is a machine with the purpose of breaking the known laws of the Universe. Hi All, Us QD folks appreciate all the questions and comments we get about the Large Hadron Collider, what we do there, and how we do it. Being head-deep in physics, though, I sometimes get the [...]The LHC sneaks along
Updated: 2012-04-28 21:48:45
Have you been paying attention to the LHC? Sure, you’ve been thinking about the scientific results being derived from last year’s data. And you are looking a few months down the road to the upcoming major conferences, now only a little more than two months away, when we might get some interesting news. But right [...]Focus: Curling Physics Unraveled
Updated: 2012-04-27 14:00:00Experiments and simulations lead to a new model for the curling of a thin strip, which could be useful for plant growth and micromechanics. Published Fri Apr 27, 2012CMS collaboration discovers its first new particle
Updated: 2012-04-27 10:48:43
Members of the CMS collaboration announced the experiment’s first discovery of a new particle today.CMS observe une nouvelle particule beauté
Updated: 2012-04-27 10:43:17
Les baryons Ξ (Xi), comme tous les baryons, sont des particules constituées de trois quarks. Le premier baryon X a été découvert dans les rayons cosmiques dans les années 50. Plus récemment, les expériences du Fermilab ont découvert les particules Xb, qui contiennent un quark b ou beauté. Cette semaine, CMS a annoncé l’observation d’un [...]CMS observes a new beauty particle
Updated: 2012-04-27 10:37:24
The Ξ (Xi) baryons, like all baryons, are particles made of three quarks. The first X baryon was discovered in cosmic rays in the 50s. More recently, Fermilab experiments discovered the Ξb particles, which contain a beauty or b quark. This week, CMS has reported the observation of a new excited state of the neutral [...]Citizen scientists find new purpose in pulsar search
Updated: 2012-04-26 19:39:10
A project that lets citizen volunteers contribute to scientists' search for gravitational waves, theoretical ripples in the fabric of space-time, has expanded its efforts -- with impressive results.
Synopsis: Prime Numbers in Frozen Territory
Updated: 2012-04-26 14:00:00The behavior of freezing transitions in glasses is related to the statistical properties of prime numbers. Published Thu Apr 26, 2012Synopsis: Quantum Testing
Updated: 2012-04-26 14:00:00Testing hypotheses about the validity of different dynamical models can now be done on a much wider range of quantum systems. Published Thu Apr 26, 2012Synopsis: Science of Slosh
Updated: 2012-04-26 14:00:00An image analysis program reveals the biomechanics of walking with coffee. Published Thu Apr 26, 2012Siegel has given up
Updated: 2012-04-26 05:41:00
: Physics Without Ideology Bite by Bite The search for a theory of everything : satire about bad candidates and gentle fun about good candidates , such as the strand-spaghetti . model 26 April 2012 Siegel has given up Warren Siegel is a physicist famous for his aggressive comments and his small stature . As a woman , I do not like nasty bearded dwarfs , so I admit being partial . Siegel works on strings and supersymmetry . His aggressive behavior against other people searching for a final theory is well-known . Besides , Siegel probably is the only person in the world claiming in writing that supersymmetry is predicted by experiment . Despite his religious devotion to supersymmetry , since many years , his papers lack any physical idea , any notable advance and any relation to experiment .What Particle Are You? | Cosmic Variance
Updated: 2012-04-25 16:45:50
A flowchart I put together for The Particle at the End of the Universe. Feel free to spread around, with appropriate attribution. Sorry for the tiny writing, there are a lot of particles! Click to embiggen and get a legible version.World’s largest digital camera one step closer to reality
Updated: 2012-04-24 16:08:57
Perched high atop Cerro Pachón in the Chilean Andes, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope will take the largest, fastest, most detailed pictures of the Southern Hemisphere’s night sky. With these images, researchers around the world will seek to reveal the nature of dark matter and dark energy—and to answer a host of other questions in [...]Viewpoint: Rethinking the Neutrino
Updated: 2012-04-23 14:00:00The Daya Bay Collaboration in China has discovered an unexpectedly large neutrino oscillation. Published Mon Apr 23, 2012Viewpoint: Photons and Atoms Cooperate, Virtually
Updated: 2012-04-23 14:00:00,Men, women and passion
Updated: 2012-04-22 08:38:00: , Physics Without Ideology Bite by Bite The search for a theory of everything : satire about bad candidates and gentle fun about good candidates , such as the strand-spaghetti . model 22 April 2012 Men , women and passion Weinberg , one of the most successful physicists ever , is now an old man . And he is sad and bitter that large particle experiments are so expensive and so tough to get . funded But why Because his own passion took the wrong . turn We women like men with a passion . We often are less passionate than men on issues , and are more passionate on human relations . We admire men with their abstract passions . Weinberg is such a man . He is passionate about particle physics since many decades , and has been an example to . many Since 50 years he goes around saying : SymmetryFocus: Asymmetric Patterns from Symmetric Forces
Updated: 2012-04-20 14:00:00A spherically symmetric interaction force between particles can cause them to self-assemble into a surprisingly asymmetric (chiral) pattern in two dimensions, according to simulations. Published Fri Apr 20, 2012Fermi uses gamma rays to unearth clues about “empty” space
Updated: 2012-04-20 01:10:12
The team working on the Large Area Telescope has discovered that most gamma rays detected by LAT cannot be attributed to individual point sources.IceCube non-detection of neutrinos from GRBs
Updated: 2012-04-19 19:52:23In a new paper in Nature, IceCube shows a solid, non-detection of neutrinos from gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). That is, the expected emission of neutrinos if GRBs were the sources of the highest energy cosmic rays was not observed. There had been a generally agreed model of GRB emission, and now it’s essentially ruled out. Cosmic [...]New entries in my lab
Updated: 2012-04-19 14:53:21
With my son I have recently measured Johnson noise and got its square root (see here) that proved to be in agreement with my theoretical expectations (see here). We built up the main instrument, the low-noise high-gain amplifier but my aim has always been to get a meaningful lab instrumentation that could make easier this [...]Synopsis: The Hunting of the Majorana Fermion
Updated: 2012-04-19 14:00:00Nanowires made from indium-antimonide offer the best chance for detecting Majorana fermions that may ultimately perform as robust qubits. Published Thu Apr 19, 2012Synopsis: Make No Assumptions
Updated: 2012-04-19 14:00:00A new method of imaging with second harmonic light allows more general studies of molecules with different orientations. Published Thu Apr 19, 2012Listening for the sound of science
Updated: 2012-04-18 15:43:13
Ever wonder what physics sounds like? Composer and network engineer Domenico Vicinanza recently created a musical score that mimics the tracks of subatomic particles.Citing nonsense 20 000 times
Updated: 2012-04-18 06:07:00: Physics Without Ideology Bite by Bite The search for a theory of everything : satire about bad candidates and gentle fun about good candidates , such as the strand-spaghetti . model 18 April 2012 Citing nonsense 20 000 times A theoretical high-energy physicist called Arkani-Hamed appears frequently on the internet . Listen to his talks . He is not a physicist , he is a missionary . For him , the key to all is supersymmetry . But nothing he ever did fits with experiment . And he is cited in research papers , in total more than 20 000 . times In today's papers , physicists do not cite correct results upon which their own correct results build . They cite friends who will help them in getting . grants Citing missionary nonsense 20 000 times does not make it true . But at least it helpsQuantum Gravity at Scientific American
Updated: 2012-04-17 19:17:06Scientific American is doing a good job this month of putting out stories related to quantum gravity that actually make sense, steering clear of the multiverse and other pseudo-science. This month’s magazine has a very nice article by Steven Carlip … Continue reading →Quantum numbers: a classical interpretation
Updated: 2012-04-15 19:10:47
TweetWe have shown throughout the Imagineer’s Chronicles and its companion book "The Reality of the Fourth *Spatial* Dimension" there would many theoretical advantages to defining the universe in terms of four *spatial* dimensions instead of four dimensional space time. One is that it would allow one to understand the arrangement of electrons in a atom [...]Focus: Photon Pairs Get More Commercial
Updated: 2012-04-13 14:00:00A semiconductor chip that generates entangled photon pairs is friendlier to integration with other chip-based quantum components than any previous device. Published Fri Apr 13, 2012Synopsis: Nanowire Lasing Explained
Updated: 2012-04-12 14:00:00A careful reassessment of zinc oxide nanolasers finds that the electrons and holes in the material are not bound together as others have suggested. Published Thu Apr 12, 2012Synopsis: Break On Through to the Other Side
Updated: 2012-04-12 14:00:00Plasmas can be made transparent to electromagnetic waves with the application of external magnetic fields. Published Thu Apr 12, 2012Synopsis: A New Phase for Photonics
Updated: 2012-04-12 14:00:00A waveguide’s dielectric properties could result in an effective gauge field for photons even though they have no charge. Published Thu Apr 12, 2012Synopsis: W Marks the Spot
Updated: 2012-04-12 14:00:00Two experimental collaborations at Fermilab report a new measurement of the W boson mass that leads to a better prediction of the mass of the Higgs boson. Published Thu Apr 12, 2012Two proposed linear collider programs to be joined under new governance
Updated: 2012-04-11 14:00:48
The world’s two most mature proposals for a collider complementary to the Large Hadron Collider are joining collaborative forces. The two proposed electron-positron collider projects, the Compact Linear Collider Study and the International Linear Collider, have traditionally been viewed as casual rivals–both in the running to be built as the future complement to CERN’s proton-smashing [...]Tevatron experiment confirms LHC discovery of Chi-b (P3) particle
Updated: 2012-04-09 17:10:38
The DZero experiment at Fermilab’s Tevatron collider has confirmed the discovery of a new particle from an experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. In December, scientists on the ATLAS experiment at the LHC announced that they had unearthed in their data a never-before-seen particle composed of two bottom quarks, called Chi-b (P3). The DZero collaboration [...]Viewpoint: New Optical Route to Magnetic State Control
Updated: 2012-04-09 14:00:00Optically switched magnetic domains are easier to control if the light source is circularly polarized. Published Mon Apr 09, 2012American Physical Society gives a prize to a fraudster
Updated: 2012-04-09 05:31:00The American Physical Society has given a prize to fraudolent string research. Peter Woit has the story here. The recipient claimed a prediction (on the Higgs mass) that was, in fact, a retrodiction.On top of the fraud, there is still a good chance that he is wrong: it might well be that the Higgs does not exist at all...Men without caring women are often lost creatures.Synopsis: Survival of the Fitter
Updated: 2012-04-05 14:00:00Hard spheres may favor one structural arrangement over others that are less mechanically stable during assembly. Published Thu Apr 05, 2012Synopsis: Group Mentality
Updated: 2012-04-05 14:00:00The scale invariance that has been seen in flocks of birds is showing up in clusters of bacteria. Published Thu Apr 05, 2012Synopsis: A Noisy Junction
Updated: 2012-04-05 14:00:00White noise in a nanoscale junction tells us how nonelectronic factors affect conduction. Published Thu Apr 05, 2012LHC physics data taking gets underway at new record collision energy of 8 TeV
Updated: 2012-04-05 09:29:31At just after midnight in Geneva, operators brought stable beams of protons into collisions at the record-breaking energy of 8 TeV — 4 TeV per beam — for the first time. This marked the beginning of the LHC experiments’ data-taking for physics for 2012. “The experience of two good years of running at 3.5 TeV [...]Physicists mobilize to rescue U.S. neutrino experiment
Updated: 2012-04-04 21:00:36
Neutrino physicists in the U.S. have begun to regroup after a disappointing setback last week, when they learned the Department of Energy would not support the budget of a major proposed experiment. The silver lining, as they see it, is that they have the chance to reevaluate their plans and find a path forward. DOE [...]Korean experiment confirms groundbreaking neutrino measurement
Updated: 2012-04-04 18:33:24
Hot on the heels of the Daya Bay experiment's completion of one of the most difficult measurements in neutrino physics, a Korean experiment has produced its own measurement confirming the earlier results.