Mpemba effect: Why hot water can freeze faster than cold

(PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists have known for generations that hot water can sometimes freeze faster than cold, an effect known as the Mpemba effect, but until now have not understood why. Several theories have been proposed, ...

Corkscrew photons may leave behind a spontaneous twist

Everything radiates. Whether it's a car door, a pair of shoes or the cover of a book, anything hotter than absolute zero (i.e., pretty much everything) is constantly shedding radiation in the form of photons, the quantum ...

World's first experimental observation of a Kondo cloud

Physicists have been trying to observe the Kondo cloud quantum phenomenon for many decades. An international research team has recently developed a novel device that successfully measures the length of the Kondo cloud and ...

Thermoelectrics: From heat to electricity

A lot of heat gets lost during the conversion of energy. Estimates even put it at more than 70%. However, in thermoelectric materials, such as those being studied at the Institute of Solid State Physics at TU Wien, heat can ...

Tokamak experiments come clean about impurity transport

A fusion reactor operates best when the hot plasma inside it consists only of fusion fuel (hydrogen's heavy isotopes, deuterium and tritium), much as a car runs best with a clean engine. But fusion fuel reactions at the heart ...

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