the physics arXiv blog

Category: Cold ‘n’ cool

  • First evidence of a supernova in an ice core

    There hasn’t been a decent supernova in our part of the universe in living memory but astronomers in the 11th century were a little more fortunate. In 1006 AD, they witnessed what is still thought to be the brightest supernova ever seen on Earth (SN 1006) and just 48 years later saw the birth of…

  • The telescope that Antarctica broke

    First light from any instrument is always exciting but particularly so when exotic locations and exciting goals are involved.  The CORONA experiment offers both. CORONA is a stellar coronagraph designed to spot extrasolar planets orbiting other stars. It is based at Dome C, some 10,000 feet above sea level in in Antarctica, a location that…

  • The frightening origins of glacial cycles

    Climatologists have known for some time that the Earth’s motion around the Sun is not as regular as it might first appear. The orbit is subject to a number of periodic effects such as the precession of the Earth’s axis which varies over periods of 19, 22 and 24 thousand years, its axial tilt which…

  • The forecast for hydrogen peroxide snow on Mars

    On Earth, wind blown dust storms generate powerful electric fields of up to 200 kV/m, with the ground becoming positively charged and the dust particles negatively charged. The mechanism behind this is poorly understood but various scientists have assumed that a similar process takes place on Mars and that it leads to bizarre phenomenon. One…

  • Trick of the light boosts atom interferometer sensitivity

    While preparing for the job of US Secretary of Energy in the incoming Obama administration (and being  director of one the top labs in the US and Nobel Prize winner to boot), Steven Chu has somehow found time to post the results of his latest experiment on the arXiv. And it’s an impressive piece of…

  • The engrossing enigma of supersolids

    Almost 40 years ago, two Russian physicists predicted the existence of a new state of matter called a supersolid. They reasoned that at very low temperatures, the rules of quantum mechanics would allow a solid to move with zero resistance and that this would allow one solid to move through another like magician walking through…

  • A revolution for the science of snowflakes

    The way snowflakes form is poorly understood. It seems clear that the process involves a subtle interplay of nonlinear effects in which small variations at the molecular level can produce large changes in the eventual shape. In particular, small levels of gaseous impurities are thought to have a major impact on the way these effects…

  • Which way does antimatter fall?

    The force of gravity on antimatter has never been directly measured but a growing number of physicists believe that such an experiment is within their grasp. Today, a group attempting to design an experiment called AEGIS (Antimatter Experiment: Gravity, Interferometry, Spectroscopy) outline their plans to measure this force. In some ways it’s an ambitious plan.…

  • First evidence that water forms in interstellar space

    Water is the most abundant solid material in space. Astronomers see it on various planets, on moons, in comets and in interstellar clouds. But how did it get there? Nobody really knows how water could possibly form in the freezing darkness of interstellar space. At least they didn’t until now. Today, Akira Kouchi and buddies…

  • The next high temperature superconductor?

    Following the discovery that a class of layered iron arsenides become superconducting above 40K, the air has been heavy with the boiling and smelting of new compounds that might also behave in this way. The trick is to find a compound that mimics the structure of the iron arsenides in question. These have a tetragonal…