News tagged with atomic nuclei

Transparent iron? For the first time, an experiment shows that atomic nuclei can become transparent

At the high-brilliance synchrotron light source PETRA III, a team of DESY scientists headed by Dr. Ralf Röhlsberger has succeeded in making atomic nuclei transparent with the help of X-ray light. At the ...

Physics / General Physics

created Feb 08, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (12) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Cosmic crashes forging gold: Nuclear reactions in space do produce the heaviest elements

(PhysOrg.com) -- Collisions of neutron stars produce the heaviest elements such as gold or lead. The cosmic site where the heaviest chemical elements such as lead or gold are formed has most likely been identified: ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Sep 09, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (25) | comments 46 | with audio podcast

Proton dripping tests a fundamental force in nature

(PhysOrg.com) -- Like gravity, the strong interaction is a fundamental force of nature. It is the essential "glue" that holds atomic nuclei—composed of protons and neutrons— together to form atoms, ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 10, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (7) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

The curious case of germanium-72: An unusual isotope changes phases as temperature rises

(PhysOrg.com) -- There's a lot we don't know about the atomic nucleus, even though it was discovered a century ago this year.

Physics / General Physics

created Jun 02, 2011 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (9) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

New project aims for fusion ignition

Russia and Italy have entered into an agreement to build a new fusion reactor outside Moscow that could become the first such reactor to achieve ignition, the point where a fusion reaction becomes self-sustaining ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 10, 2010 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (44) | comments 23 | with audio podcast

Gamma ray optics: A viable tool for a new branch of scientific discovery

Scientists at the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) have demonstrated for the first time that gamma rays, a highly energetic form of light produced by radioactive decay of atomic nuclei and amongst other used to ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 09, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (8) | comments 2

Researchers discover why atoms in solids show a preference for certain structures

(PhysOrg.com) -- Nature likes some symmetries, but dislikes others. Ordered solids often display a so-called 6-fold rotation symmetry. To achieve this kind of symmetry, the atoms in a plane surround themselves ...

Physics / General Physics

created Mar 30, 2010 | popularity 5 / 5 (21) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Computer memory takes a spin: Physicists read data after storing them in atomic nuclei for 112 seconds

University of Utah physicists stored information for 112 seconds in what may become the world's tiniest computer memory: magnetic "spins" in the centers or nuclei of atoms. Then the physicists retrieved and ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Dec 16, 2010 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (18) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

A line on string theory

(PhysOrg.com) -- A Harvard theoretical physicist has discussed with scientists at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland the possibility that they may discover a theorized "stau" particle, with a lifetime ...

Physics / General Physics

created Nov 12, 2009 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (47) | comments 15

Neutrons uncover new density waves in fermion liquids

Scientists working at the Institut Laue-Langevin, one of the world's leading centres for neutron science, have carried out the first investigation of two-dimensional fermion liquids using neutron scattering, and discovered ...

Physics / General Physics

created Mar 28, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Physics group corrals record number of neutrons into one place

(PhysOrg.com) -- Neutrons, the particles that along with protons, exist in the nuclei of atoms (except for hydrogen) have been intensely studied ever since their discovery in the 1930’s. And while many interesting developments ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 26, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (8) | comments 17 | with audio podcast report

Physicists explain the long, useful lifetime of carbon-14

The long, slow decay of carbon-14 allows archaeologists to accurately date the relics of history back to 60,000 years.

Physics / General Physics

created May 26, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (14) | comments 33 | with audio podcast

Modeling the bizarre: Quantum superfluids

(PhysOrg.com) -- More than 100 years since superconductivity was discovered, a comprehensive description for the behavior of a broad class of fundamental physical systems that exhibit the bizarre properties ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Jun 23, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

AMS particle detector heads for the International Space Station

(PhysOrg.com) -- The AMS particle detector will take off on 29 April 2011 at 21.47 CEST onboard the very last mission of the space Shuttle Endeavour. AMS, the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, will then be installed ...

Physics / General Physics

created Apr 28, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Fermi telescope explores high-energy 'space invaders'

(Physorg.com) -- Since its launch last June, NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has discovered a new class of pulsars, probed gamma-ray bursts and watched flaring jets in galaxies billions of light-years ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 04, 2009 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (12) | comments 6