https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Scientists have unveiled a new approach to powering quantum computers using quantum batteries—a breakthrough that could make future computers faster, more reliable, and more energy efficient. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-quantum-batteries-quadruple-qubit-capacity.html Quantum Physics Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:26:45 EST news688832761 For the first time, physicists have generated and observed stable bright matter-wave solitons with attractive interactions within a grid of laser light. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-breakthrough-laser-technique-quantum-stable.html Optics & Photonics Sun, 25 Jan 2026 13:00:03 EST news688141605 When we talk about disasters, we often default to the language of nature. We describe storms as "unprecedented," floods as "once-in-a-century," and heat waves as "record-breaking." While these descriptors may be technically accurate, they miss a more fundamental point: Disasters do not occur in a vacuum. They unfold within environments that humans have designed, built, maintained, and—often—neglected over long periods of time. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-infrastructure-hidden-architecture-disaster.html Environment Mon, 05 Jan 2026 17:20:01 EST news686827170 In a scientific first, South Korean scientists have provided experimental proof of "multi-scale coupling" in plasma, where interactions between phenomena at the microscopic level and macroscopic level influence each other. The findings could help advance nuclear fusion research and improve our fundamental understanding of the universe. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-experimental-device-electron-reconfigure-plasma.html Plasma Physics Mon, 11 Aug 2025 12:30:01 EDT news674133332 As Great Salt Lake's levels continue to sag, yet another strange phenomenon has surfaced, offering Utah scientists more opportunities to plumb the vast saline lake's secrets. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-mysterious-reed-mounds-reveal-vast.html Earth Sciences Fri, 11 Jul 2025 06:11:09 EDT news671433061 Why do some changes in nature unfold gradually, while others occur in the blink of an eye? Rust forming on metal is a slow, steady process that takes days or even weeks to become visible. By contrast, a power grid can collapse in mere seconds. What accounts for this difference? https://phys.org/news/2025-07-hidden-mechanics-abrupt-transitions-superconducting.html General Physics Wed, 02 Jul 2025 12:32:04 EDT news670678322 Look around, and you'll see it everywhere: the way trees form branches, the way cities divide into neighborhoods, the way the brain organizes into regions. Nature loves modularity—a limited number of self-contained units that combine in different ways to perform many functions. But how does this organization arise? Does it follow a detailed genetic blueprint, or can these structures emerge on their own? https://phys.org/news/2025-03-nature-brain-cells-ecosystems.html Ecology Tue, 11 Mar 2025 09:03:04 EDT news660902581 When studying the spread of cancer or the behavior of a virus like the one that causes COVID-19, the irony is that working with these harmful pathogens requires gentleness. Especially in the case of COVID, the particles do not survive well when making contact with surfaces. To observe a live virus and move it around, methods that make no physical contact will keep these destructive but tiny subjects alive longer, allowing more time to study them. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-kind-tool-scientists-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 19 Sep 2024 11:04:36 EDT news645962670 On May 11, a gorgeous aurora surprised stargazers across the southern United States. That same weekend, a tractor guided by GPS missed its mark. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-unprecedented-atmospheric-geomagnetic-superstorm.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 16 Aug 2024 09:00:01 EDT news643017301 The Earth was hit Monday by an intense solar storm that could bring the northern lights to night skies further south than normal, a US agency announced. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-earth-severe-solar-storm.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 13 Aug 2024 03:47:35 EDT news642739649 Our future energy may depend on high-temperature superconducting (HTS) wires. This technology's ability to carry electricity without resistance at temperatures higher than those required by traditional superconductors could revolutionize the electric grid and even enable commercial nuclear fusion. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-team-fabricates-world-highest-superconducting.html Superconductivity Wed, 07 Aug 2024 05:00:01 EDT news642180800 Space storms could soon be forecast with greater accuracy than ever before thanks to a big leap forward in our understanding of exactly when a violent solar eruption may hit Earth. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-dawn-space-storm-shield-earth.html Astronomy Fri, 19 Jul 2024 11:08:52 EDT news640606128 As California transitions rapidly to renewable fuels, it needs new technologies that can store power for the electric grid. Solar power drops at night and declines in winter. Wind power ebbs and flows. As a result, the state depends heavily on natural gas to smooth out highs and lows of renewable power. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-liquid-battery-advance-strategies-electrocatalytic.html Analytical Chemistry Wed, 12 Jun 2024 14:04:01 EDT news637419838 A powerful solar storm put on an amazing skyward light show across the globe overnight but has caused what appeared to be only minor disruptions to the electric power grid, communications and satellite positioning systems. https://phys.org/news/2024-05-solar-storm-brilliant-globe-problems.html Planetary Sciences Sat, 11 May 2024 15:35:06 EDT news634660500 New research published in Current Biology sheds light on how animals create and maintain internal spatial maps based on their surroundings. https://phys.org/news/2024-05-mice-virtual-reality-environment-reveal.html Plants & Animals Thu, 02 May 2024 15:29:24 EDT news633882558 A research team at Freie Universität Berlin has successfully developed a method for storing and electrolyzing gaseous hydrogen chloride in the form of an ionic liquid. The method allows the hydrogen chloride created as a by-product in traditional chlorination processes to be recovered and recycled in a safer manner. https://phys.org/news/2024-04-method-hydrogen-chloride.html Analytical Chemistry Thu, 04 Apr 2024 09:55:03 EDT news631443301 To achieve the aspirational goal of the Paris Agreement on climate change—limiting the increase in global average surface temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels—will require its 196 signatories to dramatically reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Those greenhouse gases differ widely in their global warming potential (GWP), or ability to absorb radiative energy and thereby warm the Earth's surface. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-atmospheric-china-emissions-potent-greenhouse.html Environment Thu, 28 Mar 2024 17:28:04 EDT news630865682 How much fuel can we add to the fire while still maintaining control? Metaphorically speaking, that's the question one team at the U.S. Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) has been asking themselves lately. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-plasma-fusion-adding-fuel.html Plasma Physics Thu, 28 Mar 2024 16:48:44 EDT news630863320 Researchers have paired a deep learning model with experimental data to "decode" mouse neural activity. Using the method, they can accurately determine where a mouse is located within an open environment and which direction it is facing just by looking at its neural firing patterns. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-scientists-mouse-based-neural.html Biotechnology Thu, 22 Feb 2024 11:00:01 EST news627813798 In early November of this year, aurora borealis were observed at surprisingly low latitudes, as far south as Italy and Texas. Such phenomena indicate the impacts of a solar coronal mass ejection on the Earth's magnetic field and atmosphere. Far more dramatic than this recent light show was, it was nothing compared to a huge solar storm in February 1872. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-largest-magnetic-storms-history-quantified.html Astronomy Thu, 30 Nov 2023 19:00:04 EST news620593201 In July 2021, heavy rain fell across Central Europe, resulting in catastrophic flooding that killed more than 220 people and left a trail of destruction costing more than US $25 billion. https://phys.org/news/2023-09-powering-faster.html Earth Sciences Mon, 11 Sep 2023 17:06:05 EDT news613670761 US scientists responsible for a historic nuclear fusion breakthrough say they have repeated the feat—this time achieving a greater yield of energy. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-lab-nuclear-fusion-feat-higher.html General Physics Mon, 07 Aug 2023 10:55:22 EDT news610624515 How are plasma eruptions in near-Earth space formed? Vlasiator, a model designed at the University of Helsinki for simulating near-Earth space, demonstrated that the two central theories on the occurrence of eruptions are simultaneously valid: eruptions are explained by both magnetic reconnection and kinetic instabilities. https://phys.org/news/2023-06-simulation-solutions-central-mystery-space.html General Physics Thu, 29 Jun 2023 12:34:03 EDT news607260841 Scientists from Jilin University, the Center for High Pressure Science and Technology Advanced Research, and Skoltech have synthesized lanthanum-cerium polyhydride, a material that promises to facilitate studies of near-room-temperature superconductivity. It offers a compromise between the polyhydrides of lanthanum and cerium in terms of how much cooling and pressure it requires. This enables easier experiments, which might one day lead scientists to compounds that conduct electricity with zero resistance at ambient conditions—an engineering dream many years in the making. The study was published in Nature Communications. https://phys.org/news/2023-05-material-room-temperature-superconductivity.html Superconductivity Fri, 12 May 2023 08:36:03 EDT news603099361 In a historic achievement, University of Rochester researchers have created a superconducting material at both a temperature and pressure low enough for practical applications. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-viable-superconducting-material-temperature-pressure.html Condensed Matter Wed, 08 Mar 2023 11:00:09 EST news597492796 The mysterious changes in phases of matter—from solid to liquid and back again—have fascinated Eun-Ah Kim since she was in lower elementary school in South Korea. Without cold drinking water readily available, on hot days the children would bring bottles of frozen water to school. https://phys.org/news/2022-11-physicist-electron-crystals.html General Physics Mon, 28 Nov 2022 12:09:03 EST news588859741 Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have created grids of tiny clumps of atoms known as quantum dots and studied what happens when electrons dive into these archipelagos of atomic islands. Measuring the behavior of electrons in these relatively simple setups promises deep insights into how electrons behave in complex real-world materials and could help researchers engineer devices that make possible powerful quantum computers and other innovative technologies. https://phys.org/news/2022-11-grid-quantum-islands-reveal-secrets.html Nanophysics Thu, 17 Nov 2022 16:49:25 EST news587926162 In the world of electricity, copper is king—for now. That could change with new research from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) that is serving up a recipe to increase the conductivity of aluminum, making it economically competitive with copper. This research opens the door to experiments that—if fully realized—could lead to an ultra-conductive aluminum alternative to copper that would be useful in markets beyond transmission lines, revolutionizing vehicles, electronics, and the power grid. https://phys.org/news/2022-06-cooking-alternative-copper-aluminum.html Materials Science Wed, 29 Jun 2022 16:49:03 EDT news575740141 A team of researchers at University College London has developed a way to keep objects levitated by sound waves airborne when other objects interfere with the levitation path. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes their self-correcting levitation system. https://phys.org/news/2022-06-levitated-falling-due.html General Physics Mon, 20 Jun 2022 09:18:51 EDT news574935478 The United States has set an ambitious goal to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by at least 50% by 2030. Are we on track to succeed? https://phys.org/news/2022-06-reduction-emissions.html Environment Thu, 02 Jun 2022 10:26:07 EDT news573384363