All Stories by Emily Conover
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PhysicsScience explains why shouting into the wind seems futile
Sending a sound upwind, against the flow of air, makes the sound louder due to an acoustical effect called convective amplification. Sound sent downwind is quieter.
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PhysicsThese worms can escape tangled blobs in an instant. Here’s how
Tangled masses of California blackworms form over minutes but untangle in tens of milliseconds. Now scientists know how.
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Quantum PhysicsA sapphire Schrödinger’s cat shows that quantum effects can scale up
The atoms in a piece of sapphire oscillate in two directions at once, a mimic of the hypothetically dead-and-alive feline.
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AstronomyThe first black hole portrait got sharper thanks to machine learning
A machine learning technique filled in data gaps in the image of M87’s black hole, resulting in a thinner ring.
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MathMathematicians have finally discovered an elusive ‘einstein’ tile
After half a century, mathematicians succeed in finding an ‘einstein,’ a shape that forms a tiled pattern that never repeats.
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AstronomyThe mystery of Christiaan Huygens’ flawed telescopes may have been solved
The discovery of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, may have come despite its discoverer, Christiaan Huygens, needing eyeglasses.
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PhysicsIs this the superconductor of scientists’ dreams? A new claim faces scrutiny
It’s big, if true: transmitting electricity with no resistance at room temperature and moderate pressure. But controversy dogs the team making the claim.
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Particle PhysicsMuons unveiled new details about a void in Egypt’s Great Pyramid
The subatomic particles revealed the dimensions of the void, discovered in 2016, and helped researchers know where to stick a camera inside.
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PhysicsThe standard model of particle physics passed one of its strictest tests yet
An experiment with a single electron, trapped for months on end, produced one of the most precise tests yet of the standard model of particle physics.
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Quantum PhysicsGoogle’s quantum computer reached an error-correcting milestone
A larger array of quantum bits outperformed a smaller one in tests performed by Google researchers, suggesting quantum computers could be scaled up.
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PhysicsHere’s why icicles made from pure water don’t form ripples
A new study explains why icicles made from pure water have irregular shapes rather than the ripples typical of the salty icicles found in nature.
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PhysicsWater is weird. A new type of ice could help us understand why
A newfound type of amorphous ice with a density close to liquid water could help scientists make sense of water’s quirks.