A physics professor who earned a Nobel prize for pioneering work that changed the way physicists think about phase transitions has died in Maine at age 77.

Physics - General Physics

3 hours ago not rated yet 1

A sphere looks the same no matter how it is rotated. Squash it on one side, however, and this symmetry is broken. A similar change from a high-symmetry state to a low-symmetry state defines many phase transitions ...

Physics - Condensed Matter

May 31, 2013 5 / 5 (3) 0

Innsbruck physicists led by Rainer Blatt and Peter Zoller experimentally gained a deep insight into the nature of quantum mechanical phase transitions. They are the first scientists that simulated the competition ...

Physics - Quantum Physics

May 20, 2013 4 / 5 (22) 5 |

Matter is categorized as either conductive, semi-conductive or resistive to the flow of electrons based on its bulk properties. However, physicists have now predicted a new state of matter in which the bulk ...

Physics - Quantum Physics

May 10, 2013 5 / 5 (2) 2 |

(Phys.org) —Shattering a glass is a completely different experience than breaking a seashell, and Cornell physicists offer a notion – at the microscale – to explain why.

Physics - Condensed Matter

May 01, 2013 5 / 5 (4) 0 |

(Phys.org) —At very low temperatures, near absolute zero, multiple particles called bosons can form an unusual state of matter in which a large fraction of the bosons in a gas occupy the same quantum state—the ...

Physics - Quantum Physics

Apr 10, 2013 4.5 / 5 (21) 4 |

Gelatin sets by forming a solid matrix full of random, liquid-filled pores—much like a saturated sponge. It turns out that a similar process also happens in some metallic glasses, substances whose molecular ...

Physics - Condensed Matter

Apr 03, 2013 5 / 5 (1) 0 |

(Phys.org) —While scientists know that information is represented in the brain by the electrical activity of neurons, the details of this representation, called "neural coding," remain mysterious. How exactly ...

Physics - General Physics

Apr 02, 2013 4.3 / 5 (10) 10 |

(Phys.org) —Like animals, plants go through several stages of development before they reach maturity. It has long been thought that some of the transitions between these stages are triggered by changes ...

Biology - Biotechnology

Mar 28, 2013 5 / 5 (3) 0 |

(Phys.org)—In ytterbium nickel phosphide there is a quantum critical point between the ferromagnetic and non-magnetic states that was previously not thought possible.

Physics - General Physics

Feb 27, 2013 4.8 / 5 (4) 0 |

The transistor is the ultimate on-off switch. When a voltage is applied to the surface of a semiconductor, current flows; when the voltage is reversed, current is blocked. Researchers have tried for decades ...

Physics - Condensed Matter

Feb 08, 2013 4.7 / 5 (7) 0 |

(Phys.org)—Starting as a few atoms long, thorns forming on the electrode's surface in a specialized lithium battery cause the battery to gradually fade, according to scientists at Pacific Northwest National ...

Nanotechnology - Nanomaterials

Jan 25, 2013 5 / 5 (2) 0 |

(Phys.org)—When it comes to high-temperature superconductors, a class of materials called cuprates is king, and it is science's ongoing quest to determine their exact physical subtleties. Cornell physicists ...

Physics - Superconductivity

Jan 16, 2013 4.8 / 5 (11) 2 |

(Phys.org)—Scientists have replaced the telescope with the microscope: Using the similarities between the structure of a crystal and the state of the cosmos in the early universe, they have explored a yet ...

Physics - General Physics

Jan 03, 2013 3.8 / 5 (13) 23 |

Topological defects in space may have developed fractions of a second after the Big Bang. Simulations of these wormlike entities and a comparison of the simulations with cosmic background radiation measurements ...

Physics - General Physics

Dec 19, 2012 4.8 / 5 (10) 1 |