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Particle Physics
Fermilab's TeVatron just released the best mass measurement of the W-boson, ever. Here's what doesn't add up.
The laws of physics state that you can't create or destroy matter without also creating or destroying an equal amount of antimatter. So how are we here?
The rhetorical fallout is greater than the radioactive fallout.
More than any other of Einstein's equations, E = mc² is the most recognizable to people. But what does it all mean?
“When molecules misbehave, it can lead to great insight.”
Life is possible because of asymmetries, such as an imbalance between matter and antimatter and the "handedness" (chirality) of molecules.
If the electromagnetic and weak forces unify to make the electroweak force, maybe, at even higher energies, something even greater happens?
The Universe has asymmetries, but that's a good thing. Imperfections are essential for the existence of stars and even life itself.
Why power generated through nuclear fusion will be the future, but not the present, solution to humanity's energy needs.
At a fundamental level, nobody knows whether gravity is truly quantum in nature. A novel experiment strongly hints that it is.
New technology is helping physicists move forward in the search for the Theory of Everything.
In movies and TV shows, aliens look like pointy-eared humans. Is this realistic? If evolution is predictable, then it very well might be.
Particle physics needs a new collider to supersede the Large Hadron Collider. Muons, not electrons or protons, might hold the key.
No matter how hard we try, we will never reach a final theory that unifies scientific knowledge. The very nature of science doesn't allow it.
No matter how controversial or politicized our world becomes, science remains humanity's best tool for figuring out how things work.
Many still cling to the idea that we live in a deterministic Universe, despite the nature of quantum physics. Now, the "least spooky" interpretation no longer works.
There are over 100 known elements in the periodic table. These 8 ways of making them account for every one.
The highest-energy particles of all come from space, not human-made colliders. When it comes to the most energetic particle collisions of all, you might think that the Large Hadron Collider […]
Why are the rest masses of fundamental particles related like this? When it comes to the nature of matter in the Universe, the Standard Model describes the known elementary particles perfectly […]
The raw ingredients just weren’t there. Thankfully, their predecessors were. Here on Earth, our planet practically overflows with life. After more than 4 billion years, life has spread to practically […]
If you can’t surpass it in a vacuum, try doing so in a medium instead. In our Universe, there are a few rules that everything must obey. Energy, momentum, and angular […]
Do they have real, observable effects, or are they merely calculational tools?
Cosmic rays aren’t just limited by the speed of light. Even among non-scientists, it’s well-understood that there’s an ultimate speed limit to the Universe: the speed of light. If you’re a […]
And which ones are probably examples where we’ve fooled ourselves? Every once in a while — multiple times per year — a new research finding fails to line up with our theoretical expectations. In […]
The Big Theoretical Physics Problem At The Center Of The ‘Muon g-2’ Puzzle In early April, 2021, the experimental physics community announced an enormous victory: they had measured the muon’s magnetic […]
The mismatch between theory and experiment is anything but certain. The most exciting moments in a scientist’s life occur when you get a result that defies your expectations. Whether you’re a […]
We need more and better data to know, but that’s exactly what’s coming. Over the past few decades, a number of important advances have helped revolutionize our picture of the Universe. […]
Is a proton fundamentally more ‘quarky’ or ‘gluey’ in nature? One question that every curious child winds up asking at some point or other is, “what are things made of?” Every […]
Using atoms to probe the Universe reveals the complete Standard Model. If you wanted to uncover the secrets of the Universe for yourself, all you’d have to do is interrogate […]
If you think it’s just three quarks held together by gluons, you’ll want to read this. At a fundamental level, the Universe is composed of indivisible particles. From macroscopic scales down […]