As Antarctica plunges deeper and deeper into winter at this time of year, the frigid continent’s surrounding lid of floating sea ice should be expanding rapidly. But this year, sea ice has been growing at an agonizingly sluggish pace that has been setting records day after day. “In the midst of its winter growth phase, Antarctic sea ice has reached a record smashing-low extent for this time of year,” according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “Sea ice extent is app ...read more
Sauropods that tower above treetops and tyrannosaurs that make the Earth tremble beneath their weighty footsteps are two iconic dinosaur images. These prehistoric giants have fascinated us for centuries, igniting our imagination and curiosity about the world that existed long before we set foot on this planet. Among the myriad of questions that arise when we ponder these magnificent creatures, two stand out. Why were some dinosaurs so big? How did their environment play a role in their size? ...read more
Physicists have long studied soap bubbles for their extraordinary geometric properties as minimal surfaces, for the way they oscillate and for the beautiful interference patterns that appear on their surfaces.So it would be easy to think that soap bubbles have little more to give in terms of exotic physics and no new applications beyond the bathtub. But that would be wrong. Enter Zala Potŏcnik and Matjaž Humar at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, who have found a way to turn soap bubble ...read more
Causality is kind of important.Causality — the concept that causes always come before effects — forms the bedrock for our physical understanding of the universe. It isn’t just a theory or law of physics. Causality is physics.Therefore, we assume causality to be true every time we construct a new theory or develop a new model. And we always bake it into each of our equations, automatically constructing models where (you guessed it) causes lead into effects.But causality doesn’t just form ...read more
Perhaps no name is more recognizable in connection with The Manhattan Project than Robert Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer, a genius theoretical physicist, was the director of the Los Alamos Lab, where the first atomic bomb was developed. (Credit:Jeffrey M. Frank/Shutterstock) replica nuclear weapon With a high level of intelligence and curiosity that started in childhood, Oppenheimer was a polymath. His breadth of knowledge exceeded the realm of physics and included history, the arts, language and ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine
