CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS | ALL TOPICS

Physicists Puzzle Over Emergence of Strange Electron Aggregates

By DANIEL GARISTO

Electrons have been seen uniting into entities with fractions of electric charge, this time without a magnetic field coaxing them into it.

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EARTH SCIENCE

Simple Equation Predicts the Shapes of Carbon-Capturing Wetlands

By GABRIEL POPKIN

To calculate the amount of carbon stored inside peatlands, researchers developed a unified theory of global "bog physics."

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Related:
A Soil-Science Revolution Upends Plans to Fight Climate Change
By Gabriel Popkin (2021)

MATHEMATICAL PHYSICS

Mathematicians Attempt to Glimpse Past the Big Bang

By STEVE NADIS

By studying the geometry of model space-times, researchers offer alternative views of the universe's first moments.

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Related:
How the Physics of Nothing Underlies Everything
By Charlie Wood (2022)

ATOMIC PHYSICS

Searching for Dark Matter with a Tabletop 'Quantum Compass'

Video by EMILY BUDER & RUI BRAZ

The physicist Alex Sushkov has developed one of the most targeted magnetic resonance experiments to date with the aim of detecting a hypothetical dark matter particle called the axion.

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QUANTA SCIENCE PODCAST

Meet Strange Metals: Where Electricity May Flow Without Electrons

By CHARLIE WOOD

For 50 years, physicists have understood current as a flow of charged particles. But a new experiment has found that in at least one strange material, this understanding falls apart.

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