Physics

Workers prepare the Fat Man, the implosion bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki in August 1945.

How Physics Drove the Design of the Atomic Bombs Dropped on Japan

The gun-like design of the Little Boy bomb was effectively the last of its kind

The Physics of a UFC Fighter so Fast, She Might Just Be Bionic

Two words: kinetic energy

Curly or straight, hairstyles are "a personal expression of beauty."

Curly Hair Science Is Revealing How Different Locks React to Heat

A mechanical engineer tackles the understudied problem of how to style curls without frying hair

Artist’s view of a black hole — the normal sized kind, mini black holes would be cuter.

Why Super-Small Black Holes Haven’t Destroyed the Universe

And probably won't

Mystery Solved: Why Puddles Don't Go On Forever

The picture of proper puddle behavior had a few missing pieces

The small, bright yellow dots are lipid cells within subcutaneous fat tissue, which can be used as natural lasers.

Living Cells Armed With Tiny Lasers May Help Fight Disease

The biological light sources may one day help researchers see deeper into the body's microscopic workings

A section of the digitally unwrapped Ein Gedi scroll, bearing text from Leviticus.

1,500-Year-Old Text Has Been Digitally Resurrected From a Hebrew Scroll

Special software helped reveal the words on a burned scroll found inside a holy ark near the Dead Sea

Tick-tock goes the clock.

Can Sound Explain a 350-Year-Old Clock Mystery?

Lab experiments suggest that a strange synchronization of pendulum clocks observed in the 1600s can be chalked up to acoustic energy

An artist's rendering of what a pentaquark structure might look like.

What Is a Pentaquark and Why Are Physicists so Excited About It?

For fifty years scientists have thought they existed, and now they finally have proof

This online article is brought to you by fiber optic cables.

"Combing" Through Light May Give Us Faster, More Powerful Internet

A lab experiment used a device called a frequency comb to send fiber optic data a record-breaking distance with no signal loss

New research suggests hawkmoths, like the one pictured above, slow down their brain's ability to process light in order to see at night.

Hovering Hawkmoths Slow Down Their Brains to See in the Dark

The insects’ night vision appears to be finely tuned to the movement of their flower food sources

Scientists Flew a Jet Plane Into a Thunderstorm to Study Antimatter

They got a little too close and saw something unexpected

A trap-jaw ant opens its massive mandibles.

Watch These Ants Hurl Themselves Out of Death Traps With Their Mouths

At least one trap-jaw ant species has coopted its exceptionally strong mandibles to escape its nemesis, the ferocious antlion

Geckos have amazingly-structured feet, but new research indicates that the lizards' skin also possesses exceptional properties.

Water Drops Leap Off Gecko Skin Thanks to Tiny Spines

Specialized hydrophobic structures on gecko skin encourage dewdrops to be swept away by the wind or to collide and shoot off one another like pool balls

This Is Next-Level Origami

From dancing cranes to protective structures, origami is popping up in science and tech

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How Praying Mantises Can Jump Faster Than the Blink of an Eye

Stunning slow-mo videos capture juvenile mantises as they corkscrew through the air and precisely land their target

This optical atomic clock uses strontium atoms to tell time.

Send Atomic Clocks to Space to Find Gravitational Waves

A new breed of the hyper-accurate clocks could help scientists detect the elusive ripples in space-time faster and cheaper

Is Our Universe Supersymmetric?

Scientists hope the rebooted Large Hadron Collider could find supersymmetric particles—the next frontier of particle physics

What Physics Tells Us About Making the Perfect Chocolate

Like carbon, the treat can take on many crystalline forms, so a master chocolatier must know how to temper it in just the right way

At Last, Make Perfect Popcorn With Science

Physicists now know why popcorn pops

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