Browse Physics

A robust measurement scheme indicates that a spin-related torque that speeds up moving domain walls in magnetic nanostructures is larger than previously estimated.

Diffraction techniques are making progress in tackling the difficult problem of solving the structures of nanoparticles and nanoscale materials.

A new experiment shows that entangled electron pairs can be spatially split into different arms of a carbon nanotube. Is a nanotube quantum teleporter on the horizon?

A new approach to reduce spherical and chromatic aberration in electron microscopy allows for low-energy imaging of single-layer boron nitride, a novel 2D nanostructure that is analogous to graphene.

A theoretical analysis of recent experiments suggests that a key feature of a topological quantum computer—the unusual statistics of quasiparticles in the quantum Hall effect—may finally have been observed.

A microscopic study of magnetic nanoislands on a surface challenges the widely held view that all atoms in a relaxing nanoparticle flip their spins in unison.

Quantum states in disordered solids are characterized by wild spatial fluctuations. As a result, the behavior of a single typical wave function differs markedly from the ensemble average.

The complete geometry of ${\text{C}}_{60}$ molecules adsorbed on a silver surface has been determined for the first time with low-energy electron diffraction.

With a high-energy electron beam, it is possible to carve out atomically thin strands of carbon. Whether these carbon structures are conducting remains an open question.

Measurements of the heat transport at the edges of two-dimensional electron systems appear to provide explanations about the quantum Hall state that have not been forthcoming via charge transport experiments.

Researchers bring the prospect of new electronic devices based on oxide materials closer to reality by doping interfaces via polar discontinuities rather than chemical substitution.

Scientists have found that the spontaneous ferroelectric polarization can be fully and reversibly flipped by varying partial oxygen pressure above the surface of an epitaxially compressed ${\text{PbTiO}}_3$ film. The inward polarized state is stabilized by ordered oxygen vacancies in the topmost atomic layer.

If a magnet is small enough, an electric current carrying polarized spins can flip it around. Scientists are finding clever ways to control this spin-torque effect precisely, both for when it is wanted and when it is not.

Most applications based on magnetism are incompatible with domain walls, which interrupt a homogeneous magnetization. Scientists are turning this view around as they discover new ways to use an electric current to manipulate and store information in nanoscale domain walls.

A molecule that links two metal electrodes could function like a chemically tunable miniature electronic device, provided that electrons can move easily across the molecular junction. A group in Leiden has now made highly conducting molecular junctions with benzene.

Modification of electromagnetic zero-point fluctuations by closely spaced conductors causes an interaction between them called the Casimir force. New experiments with nanostructured silicon substrates show that the geometry of the conducting surfaces has a large effect on this force.