News tagged with electromagnetic waves

Engineered materials: Custom-made magnets

A novel approach to designing artificial materials could enable magnetic devices with a wider range of properties than those now available. An international team of researchers have now extended the properties ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created May 24, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Invisibility cloak that generates virtual images gets closer to realization

(PhysOrg.com) -- In a twist on the concept of an invisibility cloak, researchers have designed a material that not only makes an object invisible, but also generates one or more virtual images in its place. ...

Physics / General Physics

created Apr 02, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (31) | comments 6 | with audio podcast feature

Physicists build quantum amplifier with single artificial atom

(PhysOrg.com) -- By demonstrating how a single artificial atom can be used to amplify electromagnetic waves, physicists from Japan are opening up new possibilities for quantum amplifiers, which can be used ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created May 25, 2010 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (23) | comments 3 | with audio podcast feature

Lightning signature could help reveal the solar system's origins

Every second, lightning flashes some 50 times on Earth. Together these discharges coalesce and get stronger, creating electromagnetic waves circling around Earth, to create a beating pulse between the ground ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 04, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (8) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

The new world of gamma-ray optics

Scientists discover that certain materials like silicon or gold exhibit a surprisingly large refractive index for extremely high energetic gamma-rays.

Physics / Condensed Matter

created May 14, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 0

In a major breakthrough, scientists control light propagation in photonic chips

Researchers at Columbia Engineering School have built optical nanostructures that enable them to engineer the index of refraction and fully control light dispersion. They have shown that it is possible for light (electromagnetic ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created Jul 10, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (18) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Sharpening the nanofocus: Researchers use nanoantenna to enhance plasmonic sensing

(PhysOrg.com) -- Such highly coveted technical capabilities as the observation of single catalytic processes in nanoreactors, or the optical detection of low concentrations of biochemical agents and gases ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created May 17, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (4) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

A Theory of Dark Matter

Among the most astounding, unexpected, and important achievements of the past century (or even more) have been the discoveries of dark matter and dark energy, collectively dubbed the "dark sector."

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 08, 2009 | popularity 3.6 / 5 (45) | comments 58

Wireless power could cut cord for patients with implanted heart pumps

Mechanical pumps to give failing hearts a boost were originally developed as temporary measures for patients awaiting a heart transplant. But as the technology has improved, these ventricular assist devices ...

Technology / Engineering

created Jul 12, 2011 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (5) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

A breakthrough for terahertz semiconductor lasers

(PhysOrg.com) -- Potential applications, says an engineering professor, include disease diagnosis and detection of concealed explosives.

Physics / General Physics

created Jan 13, 2011 | popularity 3.5 / 5 (11) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Seeing the light: Scientists bring plasmonic nanofields into focus

In typical plasmonic devices, electromagnetic waves crowd into tiny metal structures, concentrating energy into nanoscale dimensions. Due to coupling of electronics and photonics in these metal ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Feb 03, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (11) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Scientists closer to making invisibility cloak a reality

J.K. Rowling may not have realized just how close Harry Potter's invisibility cloak was to becoming a reality when she introduced it in the first book of her best-selling fictional series in 1998. Scientists, however, have ...

Other Sciences / Mathematics

created Mar 05, 2009 | popularity 3.7 / 5 (25) | comments 8

Probing the dark side of the universe

Advancing into the next frontier in astrophysics and cosmology depends on our ability to detect the presence of a particular type of wave in space, a primordial gravitational wave. Much like ripples moving ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 20, 2010 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (15) | comments 99 | with audio podcast

A New Cloaking Method: This is not a 'Star Trek' or 'Harry Potter' Story (w/ Video)

(PhysOrg.com) -- University of Utah mathematicians developed a new cloaking method, and it's unlikely to lead to invisibility cloaks like those used by Harry Potter or Romulan spaceships in "Star Trek." Instead, ...

Physics / General Physics

created Aug 17, 2009 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (13) | comments 5

World's smallest semiconductor laser heralds new era in optical science

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have reached a new milestone in laser physics by creating the world's smallest semiconductor laser, capable of generating visible light ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created Aug 30, 2009 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (25) | comments 1

Electromagnetic radiation

Electromagnetic radiation (sometimes abbreviated EMR) is a ubiquitous phenomenon that takes the form of self-propagating waves in a vacuum or in matter. It consists of electric and magnetic field components which oscillate in phase perpendicular to each other and perpendicular to the direction of energy propagation. Electromagnetic radiation is classified into several types according to the frequency of its wave; these types include (in order of increasing frequency and decreasing wavelength): radio waves, microwaves, terahertz radiation, infrared radiation, visible light, ultraviolet radiation, X-rays and gamma rays. A small and somewhat variable window of frequencies is sensed by the eyes of various organisms; this is what we call the visible spectrum, or light.

EM radiation carries energy and momentum that may be imparted to matter with which it interacts.

For more information about Electromagnetic radiation, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.