The real show-stopper for science is a shortage of school teachers in general, and a chronic shortage of science teachers in particular, that threatens the economic prosperity of the country in a knowledge-based world. The new government has it in its power to increase salaries for teachers and, at the same time, reduce the administrative […]
Enormous advances in solar and stellar physics have been made in recent years as a result of helioseismology – the study of vibrations on the surface of the Sun. However, the Sun is only one star among many. While we believe it is a typical star, we do not know for certain. What we need […]
Does the world needs nuclear power? Peter Hodgson and Dennis Anderson take up the debate
Read article: Do we need nuclear power?
At room temperature, the extraordinary magnetoresistance of such non-magnetic materials is much larger than that of other magnetic materials, including those that exhibit giant or colossal magnetoresistance. Now Joseph Heremans and co-workers at Delphi Research Laboratories in Michigan, US, have shown that there can also be a significant geometric contribution to the so-called magnetothermopower of […]
In 1984 – the year made famous by George Orwell – I attended a physics conference in the city of Leipzig, East Germany. It was my first visit since I had been a student there 16 years before. As I had imagined, I was constantly followed by officers from the East German secret police, the […]
Read article: A universe in the life of an oxygen atom
Last year our group at the California Institute of Technology teamed up with Loren Pfeiffer and Ken West of Bell Labs to study how electrons tunnel between two parallel 2-D electron gases. These electrons reside in a semiconductor heterostructure consisting of two thin layers of gallium arsenide separated by a barrier layer of aluminium gallium […]
Michael Berry, Irene Marzoli and Wolfgang Schleich on the interference of waves that weave rich tapestries in space and space–time
Read article: Quantum carpets, carpets of light
Recent data from the cosmic microwave background add further weight to the inflationary big-bang model. But more precise measurements from NASA's MAP satellite could challenge this theory
Read article: Microwaves map cosmic origins
A new theory to predict the properties of nuclei is boosted by real data
Visible radiation from metal ions is used to create the word's most accurate clock
