Time unaffected by eclipse
The experiments were carried out by Thomas Udem from the Max-Planck Institute for Quantum Optics in Garching and colleagues. Udem and colleagues placed four atomic clocks – one rubidium clock, t...
Astronomy and physics dominate Science top ten
Confirmation that the universe is flat – expanding at just the right rate not to collapse – came from measurements of ripples in the cosmic background radiation left over from the big bang...
The decay route to teleportation
In quantum teleportation the quantum state of an object held by “Alice” is instantaneously sent to “Bob”. The new technique works by having two optical cavities that both conta...
Light glimpsed from extra-solar planet
Light from the planet is almost completely obliterated by the bright glare from the star. Although the reflected signal is 10-20,000 times weaker than the glare from tau Bootis, the planet studied by ...
Students reject revamped physics degree
In a series of interviews with a wide cross-section of students who remained in the physics programme, Booth and Ingerman discovered that many students could not adequately explain the links between t...
XMM launches
XMM will be in a highly elliptical orbit to keep it away from interference caused by the Sun’s glare. The telescope’s large size and unusual orbit explains why XMM was launched from Ariane...
NASA revises Mars missions
NASA’s Mission Control Center hoped that the Deep Space Two micoprobe had landed safely and gone into a ‘sleep’ safety mode. But all attempts to contact the probes have failed. Durin...
UK physics gets new funding boost
The JIF scheme is funded by the UK government and the Wellcome Trust, the world’s largest biomedical research charity. It was set up after several reports found that a shortage of state-of-the-a...
Explaining high-Tc superconductors
Even a decade and a half after the discovery of high-temperature superconductivity in ceramic compounds containing copper-oxide planes, these materials continue to puzzle condensed-matter theorists. T...
Read article: Explaining high-Tc superconductors
Quantum gravity presents the ultimate challenge to theorists
Physics in the 20th century is founded on the twin pillars of quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity. However, in spite of the enormous successes of each theory individually, the two appear to...
Read article: Quantum gravity presents the ultimate challenge to theorists
