Physics

166 articles with this tag

How Pulsars Work—the Universe's Cosmic Lighthouses Science

How Pulsars Work—the Universe's Cosmic Lighthouses

Pulsars are rapidly spinning neutron stars that sweep beams of radiation across space like cosmic lighthouses. Here is how they form, why they tick wi...

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How Singlet Fission Works—and Why It Could Transform Solar Science

How Singlet Fission Works—and Why It Could Transform Solar

Singlet fission is a quantum process that splits one photon's energy into two electron-hole pairs, potentially pushing solar cell efficiency far beyon...

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How Lightning Works on Jupiter—and Why It's So Extreme Science

How Lightning Works on Jupiter—and Why It's So Extreme

Jupiter produces lightning bolts up to a million times more powerful than Earth's. From ammonia mushballs to stealth superstorms, here is how the gas...

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How Heavy Water Reactors Work—and Why They Matter Science

How Heavy Water Reactors Work—and Why They Matter

Heavy water reactors use deuterium oxide instead of ordinary water to moderate nuclear reactions, enabling the use of natural uranium fuel — but also...

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How Mass Spectrometry Works—and Why It Matters Science

How Mass Spectrometry Works—and Why It Matters

Mass spectrometry identifies molecules by measuring their mass-to-charge ratio. From drug discovery to forensics, this century-old technique underpins...

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How Ice Melt Slows Earth's Spin—and Warps Time Science

How Ice Melt Slows Earth's Spin—and Warps Time

Melting polar ice redistributes mass from the poles to the equator, slowing Earth's rotation and lengthening days by milliseconds per century—with rea...

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What Is Earth's Albedo and Why It Keeps Dropping Science

What Is Earth's Albedo and Why It Keeps Dropping

Earth's albedo — the fraction of sunlight our planet reflects back to space — is declining to record lows, accelerating global warming through powerfu...

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How Nuclear Propulsion Works in Space Science

How Nuclear Propulsion Works in Space

Nuclear propulsion promises to cut Mars travel time in half by using fission reactors to power spacecraft, offering far greater efficiency than chemic...

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What Are Red Giant Stars and How Do They Form? Science

What Are Red Giant Stars and How Do They Form?

Red giants are enormous, cool stars in a late stage of stellar evolution. When a star exhausts its hydrogen fuel, its core contracts while its outer l...

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What Is Antimatter and Why Is It So Hard to Move? Science

What Is Antimatter and Why Is It So Hard to Move?

Antimatter is the mirror image of ordinary matter and annihilates on contact with it, making it the most expensive and volatile substance on Earth. He...

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Australia Builds World's First Quantum Battery Prototype Science

Australia Builds World's First Quantum Battery Prototype

Australian researchers from CSIRO, RMIT University, and the University of Melbourne have created the first proof-of-concept quantum battery that compl...

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How Chip Lithography Works—and Why One Company Owns It Technology

How Chip Lithography Works—and Why One Company Owns It

Chip lithography uses light to print nanoscale circuits onto silicon wafers. One Dutch company, ASML, holds a total monopoly on the most advanced mach...

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