Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Physics

One of NIST’s ytterbium optical lattice clocks.

Scientists Measure the Second With Record-Breaking Precision

A new generation of optical clocks are becoming ever more reliable as physicists work to redefine time

U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules aircraft fire chaff and flare countermeasures over the Nevada Test and Training Range Nov. 17, 2010.

The Woman Whose Invention Helped Win a War — and Still Baffles Weathermen

Her work long overlooked, physicist Joan Curran developed technology to conceal aircraft from radar during World War II

The NIST-4 Kibble balance, an electromagnetic weighing machine that is used to measure Planck's constant, and in turn, redefine the kilogram.

Scientists Are About to Redefine the Kilogram and Shake Up Our System of Measures

After more than 100 years of defining the kilogram according to a metal artifact, humanity is preparing to change the unit based on a constant of nature

A silica sphere with a radius of 50 nanometers is trapped levitating in a beam of light.

Optical Tweezers Give Scientists a Tool to Test the Laws of Quantum Mechanics

Quantum superposition is one of the great mysteries of physics—a mass existing in two states at once—and scientists hope to probe the phenomenon

When in Rome...

New Research

The Physics of a Perfect Pizza

It takes just the right amount of heat and conduction to turn dough into the perfect Roman Margherita pizza

Does the Same Goose Always Lead the Flying V and More Questions From Our Readers

You asked, we answered

New Research

We Haven’t Been Zapped Out Of Existence Yet, So Other Dimensions Are Probably Super Tiny

In theory, other dimensions aren’t big enough to form black holes and consume our universe or it would have happened already

Nobel Prize winner Donna Strickland photographed in her lab.

The Nobels Notoriously Overlook Women Physicists. Donna Strickland’s Win Puts That Disparity into the Spotlight

Nobel committee recognizes three physicists in total, all of whom contributed to advancing laser technology

None

New Research

Watch the Strongest Indoor Magnetic Field Blast Doors of Tokyo Lab Wide Open

The unexpectedly large 1,200 tesla boom could help researchers explore quantum physics and help in the quest for nuclear fusion

The coating, if used on enough buildings at once, could also help deal with so-called “urban heat islands.”

This New Coating Could Help Keep Buildings Cool

The porous polymer uses tiny air holes to reflect all wavelengths of sunlight, cooling buildings far better than white paint

New Research

Hey Fellow Kids, This Is How You Flip a Water Bottle

New paper by undergrads illuminates the physics behind the Water Bottle Challenge

New Research

Explorers Will Face Dangerous Amounts of Radiation On Their Trip to Mars

New data from the Mars Trace Gas Orbiter shows just the flight there and back alone will expose astronauts to 60 percent the lifetime radiation dose

New Research

The Universe’s Strongest Material is a Cosmic Lasagna

A new study suggests that the “nuclear pasta” found in neutron stars is 10 billion times stronger than steel

A postage stamp printed in Norway showing an image of Alfred Nobel, circa 2001.

Commentary

Should the Nobel Prizes Take a Year Off?

An award designed to go to those who benefit all humanity has a history of prejudice and controversy

Artist's impression of galactic wind.

New Research

Astronomers Spot Galactic Wind From Early Universe

The ejection of molecular gas from a galaxy 12 billion light-years away may have kept an early galaxy from burning out too quickly

An artist's rendering of a space elevator.

Trending Today

Japan Takes Tiny First Step Toward Space Elevator

Two mini-satellites will test elevator motion in space as part of research for an elevator between Earth and low orbit

In acoustophoretic printing, sound waves generate a controllable force that pulls each droplet off of the nozzle when it reaches a specific size and ejects it towards the printing target.

Watch This New Device Print Using Sound Waves

Harvard scientists develop a printing technique that could impact a slew of industries, from biopharmaceuticals to food and cosmetics

A few pages from the recently digitized codex.

Cool Finds

See Leonardo da Vinci’s Genius Yourself in These Newly Digitized Sketches

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has made ultra high-resolution scans of two codices available online

Artist's rendering of COSMOS-AzTEC-1.

New Research

Monster Galaxy Churns Out 1,000 Times As Many Stars As Our Own

COSMOS-AzTEC-1 is almost 13 billion years old highly organized but unstable and could shed light on galaxy evolution

A STEVE lights up the night over British Columbia.

New Research

STEVE the Purple Beam of Light Is Not An Aurora After All

In a second study of mysterious phenomena, researchers discovered that solar particles hitting the ionosphere do not power the violet, vertical streaks

Page 11 of 30