Grab a mixing bowl from your kitchen, throw in a handful of aluminum balls, apply some high voltage, and watch an elegant dance unfold where particles re-arrange themselves into a distinct "crystal" pattern. This curious ...
General Physics
Oct 21, 2019
2
235
Magnetic reconnection, a process in which magnetic field lines tear and come back together, releasing large amounts of kinetic energy, occurs throughout the universe. The process gives rise to auroras, solar flares and geomagnetic ...
Plasma Physics
Oct 21, 2019
0
166
Assembly of the Plasma Liner Experiment (PLX) at Los Alamos National Laboratory is well underway with the installation of 18 of 36 plasma guns in an ambitious approach to achieving controlled nuclear fusion (Figure 1). The ...
Plasma Physics
Oct 21, 2019
3
4894
Most plants have plenty of enemies, from insects and other grazing creatures to various diseases, droughts and many other stressors.
Plants & Animals
Oct 15, 2019
0
32
Physicists at Stockholm University and the Max Planck Institute for Physics have turned to plasmas in a proposal that could revolutionise the search for the elusive dark matter.
General Physics
Oct 9, 2019
56
480
A key requirement for future facilities that aim to capture and control on Earth the fusion energy that drives the sun and stars is accurate predictions of the pressure of the plasma—the hot, charged gas that fuels fusion ...
Plasma Physics
Sep 20, 2019
13
146
For 400 years people have tracked sunspots, the dark patches that appear for weeks at a time on the sun's surface. They have observed but been unable to explain why the number of spots peaks every 11 years.
Plasma Physics
Sep 19, 2019
2
352
When energy is added to uranium under pressure, it creates a shock wave, and even a tiny sample will be vaporized like a small explosion. By using smaller, controlled explosions, physicists can test on a microscale in a safe ...
Plasma Physics
Aug 23, 2019
4
688
Scientists who use magnetic fields to bottle up and control on Earth the fusion reactions that power the sun and stars must correct any errors in the shape of the fields that contain the reactions. Such errors produce deviations ...
Plasma Physics
Aug 6, 2019
26
609
An international team of scientists led by the University of Sheffield have discovered previously undetected observational evidence of frequent energetic wave pulses the size of the UK, transporting energy from the solar ...
Space Exploration
Aug 5, 2019
33
263
