Phys.org Physics

• Tightening the net around the elusive sterile neutrino

  Neutrinos, though nearly invisible, are among the most numerous matter particles in the universe. The Standard Model recognizes three types, but the discovery of neutrino oscillations revealed they have mass and can change identity while propagating.

• Long-standing puzzle in electron scattering deepens with new measurement

  Why does lead behave so differently from every other atomic nucleus when struck by electrons? A team of physicists at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) has taken an important step toward answering this question, only to find that the mystery is even deeper than previously thought. The findings were published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

• How Ramanujan's formulae for pi connect to modern high energy physics

  Most of us first hear about the irrational number π (pi)—rounded off as 3.14, with an infinite number of decimal digits—in school, where we learn about its use in the context of a circle. More recently, scientists have developed supercomputers that can estimate up to trillions of its digits.

• New levitating sensors could pave way to dark matter detection and quantum sensing

  A new type of sensor that levitates dozens of glass microparticles could revolutionize the accuracy and efficiency of sensing, laying the foundation for better autonomous vehicles, navigation and even the detection of dark matter.

• Optical clock sets new accuracy record, bringing us closer to a new definition of the second

  A research team at VTT MIKES has set a new record in optical-clock absolute frequency measurements using a strontium single-ion clock with exceptionally low uncertainty and high uptime.

• Scientists advance quantum signaling with twisted light technology

  A tiny device that entangles light and electrons without super-cooling could revolutionize quantum tech in cryptography, computing, and AI.

• Seeing physics as a mountain landscape for classification of nonlinear systems

  Imagine standing on top of a mountain. From this vantage point, we can see picturesque valleys and majestic ridges below, and streams wind their way downhill. If a drop of rain falls somewhere on this terrain, gravity guides it along a path until it settles in one of the valleys. The trajectory traced by this droplet is known as a flow line, a path that indicates the direction of movement determined by the landscape's gradient.

• Geodesic approach links quantum physics and gravitation

  It is something like the "Holy Grail" of physics: unifying particle physics and gravitation. The world of tiny particles is described extremely well by quantum theory, while the world of gravitation is captured by Einstein's general theory of relativity. But combining the two has not yet worked—the two leading theories of theoretical physics still do not quite fit together.

• Physicists overcome fundamental limitation of acoustic levitation

  Using sound to get objects to float works well if a single particle is levitated, but it causes multiple particles to collapse into a clump in mid-air. Physicists at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) have now found a way to keep them apart using charge. Their findings, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could find applications in materials science, robotics, and microengineering.

• Synchrotron radiation sources: Toolboxes for quantum technologies

  Synchrotron radiation sources generate highly brilliant light pulses, ranging from infrared to hard X-rays, which can be used to gain deep insights into complex materials.

• Single-photon teleportation achieved between distant quantum dots for the first time

  An international research team involving Paderborn University has achieved a crucial breakthrough on the road to a quantum internet. For the first time ever, the polarization state of a single photon emitted from a quantum dot was successfully teleported to another physically separated quantum dot.

• Why your faucet drips: Water jet breakup traced to angstrom-scale thermal capillary waves

  Some phenomena in our daily lives are so commonplace that we don't realize there could be some very interesting physics behind them. Take a dripping faucet: why does the continuous stream of water from a faucet eventually break up into individual droplets? A team of physicists studied this question and reached surprising conclusions.

• On-demand electronic switching of topology achieved in a single crystal

  University of British Columbia (UBC) scientists have demonstrated a reversible way to switch the topological state of a quantum material using mechanisms compatible with modern electronic devices. Published in Nature Materials, the study offers a new route toward more energy efficient electronics based on topologically protected currents rather than conventional charge flow.

• New magnetic sensor material discovered using high-throughput experimental method

  A NIMS research team has developed a new experimental method capable of rapidly evaluating numerous material compositions by measuring anomalous Hall resistivity 30 times faster than conventional methods. By analyzing the vast amount of data obtained using machine learning and experimentally validating the predictions, the team succeeded in developing a new magnetic sensor material capable of detecting magnetism with much higher sensitivity. This research was published in npj Computational Materials on September 3, 2025.

• Physicists create 'quantum wire' where mass and energy flow without friction or loss

  In physical systems, transport takes many forms, such as electric current through a wire, heat through metal, or even water through a pipe. Each of these flows can be described by how easily the underlying quantity—charge, energy, or mass—moves through a material.

• Controlling quantum states in germanene using only an electric field

  Researchers at the University of Twente and Utrecht University demonstrated for the first time that quantum states in the ultra-narrow material germanene can be switched on and off using only an electric field. The researchers were able to vary the electric field strength very precisely, causing the special 'topological' states in nanoribbons to disappear or appear.

• High pressure increases terahertz emission 13-fold in 2D semiconductor GaTe, study reveals

  A new study led by the Aerospace Information Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with their collaborators, has demonstrated that high pressure can significantly enhance and precisely tune terahertz (THz) radiation from the two-dimensional semiconductor gallium telluride (GaTe).

• New digital state of matter could help build stable quantum computers

  Scientists have taken another major step toward creating stable quantum computers. Using a specialized quantum computer chip (an essential component of a quantum computer) as a kind of tiny laboratory, a team led by Pan Jianwei at the University of Science and Technology of China has created and studied a rare and complex type of matter called higher-order nonequilibrium topological phases.

• Calibrating qubit charge to make quantum computers even more reliable

  Quantum computers will be able to assume highly complex tasks in the future. With superconducting quantum processors, however, it has thus far been difficult to read out experimental results because measurements can cause interfering quantum state transitions.

• HIE-ISOLDE: Ten years, ten highlights

  The Isotope Separator On-Line facility (ISOLDE) directs a proton beam from the Proton Synchrotron Booster (PSB) onto specially developed thick targets, producing low-energy beams of radioactive nuclei—those with too many or too few neutrons to be stable. These beams can be further accelerated to energies of up to 10 MeV per nucleon using the HIE-ISOLDE linear accelerator, enabling a wide range of studies.

• The case for an antimatter Manhattan project

  Chemical rockets have taken us to the moon and back, but traveling to the stars demands something more powerful. Space X's Starship can lift extraordinary masses to orbit and send payloads throughout the solar system using its chemical rockets, but it cannot fly to nearby stars at 30% of light speed and land. For missions beyond our local region of space, we need something fundamentally more energetic than chemical combustion, and physics offers, or, in other words, antimatter.

• Noise-proof quantum sensor uses three calcium ions held in place by electric fields

  Researchers at the University of Innsbruck have shown that quantum sensors can remain highly accurate even in extremely noisy conditions. It's the first experimental realization of a powerful quantum sensing protocol, outperforming all comparable classical strategies—even under overwhelming noise.

• Dislocations without crystals: Burgers vectors discovered in glass

  For nearly a century, scientists have understood how crystalline materials—such as metals and semiconductors—bend without breaking. Their secret lies in tiny, line-like defects called dislocations, which move through an orderly atomic lattice and carry deformation with them.

• Detecting strong-to-weak symmetry breaking might be impossible, study shows

  When a system undergoes a transformation, yet an underlying physical property remains unchanged, this property is referred to as "symmetry." Spontaneous symmetry breaking (SSB) occurs when a system breaks out of this symmetry when it is most stable or in its lowest-possible energy state.

• Rapid X-ray pulses enable 100-fold efficiency boost for photoionization

  Speed matters. When an X-ray photon excites an atom or ion, making a core electron jump onto a higher energy level, a short-lived window of opportunity opens. For just a few femtoseconds, before an electron fills the void in the lower energy level, a second photon has the chance to be absorbed by another core electron, creating a doubly excited state.