Probing Fundamental Physics Neutrinos offer rare clues that a more complete theory of particles must supersede the 50-year-old set of equations known as the Standard Model. This model describes elementary particles and forces with near-perfect precision, but it errs when it comes to neutrinos: It predicts that the neutral particles are massless, but they aren’t… Continue reading A New Map of the Universe, Painted With Cosmic Neutrinos
Tag: Quantum Stuff
Neural Networks Need Data to Learn. Even If It’s Fake.
On a sunny day in late 1987, a Chevy van drove down a curvy wooded path on the campus of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. The hulking vehicle, named Navlab, wasn’t notable for its beauty or speed, but for its brain: It was an experimental version of an autonomous vehicle, guided by four powerful computers… Continue reading Neural Networks Need Data to Learn. Even If It’s Fake.
Extreme Heat Is Deadlier Than Hurricanes, Floods and Tornadoes Combined
On June 25, 2022, Esteban Chavez, Jr., started his day like any other, working his route in Pasadena, Calif., as a driver for UPS. But the city was in the middle of an intense heat wave, and by midafternoon the temperature was higher than 90 degrees Fahrenheit. After completing his last delivery of the day,… Continue reading Extreme Heat Is Deadlier Than Hurricanes, Floods and Tornadoes Combined
Wildfires Will Only Get Worse. We Need Satellite Tracking of Air Pollution
People on the East Coast earlier this month experienced something that occurs with relative frequency in the West: ominous orange skies lit up by dense wildfire smoke. Across the I-95 corridor they responded with many important questions: How bad is the air quality where I live? Can I exercise outside? When will the smoke go… Continue reading Wildfires Will Only Get Worse. We Need Satellite Tracking of Air Pollution
How the Brain Protects Itself From Blood-Borne Threats
Enough pints of beer can have you falling off your bar stool or loudly reciting lyrics to early 2000s jams to total strangers, because alcohol can get past one of the strongest defenses in the body. If you’ve ever been drunk, high or drowsy from allergy medication, you’ve experienced what happens when some molecules defeat… Continue reading How the Brain Protects Itself From Blood-Borne Threats
The Simple Geometry That Predicts Molecular Mosaics
Over the next year, Domokos and his colleagues used geometric thinking to unpack the rules of molecular self-assembly — devising a new way to constrain the mosaics that molecules can form, using only the simple geometry of tessellation. “At first, they did not believe that you can do it,” Domokos said. “They were doing artificial… Continue reading The Simple Geometry That Predicts Molecular Mosaics
Do Insects Feel Joy and Pain?
In the early 1990s, when I was a Ph.D. student at the Free University of Berlin modeling the evolution of bee color perception, I asked a botany professor for some advice about flower pigments. I wanted to know the degrees of freedom that flowers have in producing colors to signal to bees. He replied, rather… Continue reading Do Insects Feel Joy and Pain?
Mathematicians Discover New Way to Predict Structure in Graphs
It has been an exhilarating year in combinatorics research. In early 2023, mathematicians were stunned when two of the biggest problems in the field were solved in as many months. Now, a third major question has fallen with a 14-page proof “that has absolutely all the right ideas,” said Mehtaab Sawhney of the Massachusetts Institute… Continue reading Mathematicians Discover New Way to Predict Structure in Graphs
Computer Scientists Inch Closer to Major Algorithmic Goal
“In other words,” Sun said, “in order to further improve graph isomorphism, group isomorphism is a big bottleneck.” A Problem Transformed When progress on a problem stalls as long as it did for group isomorphism, invention is usually necessary to get unstuck. “When you have a big advance, that should be some indication that there’s… Continue reading Computer Scientists Inch Closer to Major Algorithmic Goal
In New Paradox, Black Holes Appear to Evade Heat Death
The AdS/CFT duality has been reliably blowing people’s minds for over 25 years. It’s hard to visualize how such different systems as a black hole and a hot plasma could be equivalent. Now it seems that the difficulty is not just a failure of the human imagination, but a feature of the mathematics. As a… Continue reading In New Paradox, Black Holes Appear to Evade Heat Death