Browse Physics

Design ideas for making new optical devices borrow from supersymmetry, a candidate theory in particle physics.

A newly-developed “quantum microscope” uses photoionization and an electrostatic magnifying lens to directly observe the electron orbitals of an excited hydrogen atom.

Natural defect states can render nanomechanical oscillators nonlinear and allow creation of nonclassical mechanical states.

A new standard for measuring the relative size of a quantum object could help in comparing different experiments at the quantum-classical boundary.

Entanglement of two atoms is achieved by the detection of a single photon.

Spin-orbit-coupled cold atomic gases are proposed as a model system for observing the signatures of quantum chaos.

A generalized form of the Pauli exclusion principle gives insight into the quantum wave function describing multiple electrons.

Compared to classical solids, the quantum solid helium-4 can undergo a giant plastic deformation that is also reversible.

Quantum Hall effects can be exploited to tune, reverse, and even eliminate the Casimir force between two graphene sheets.

The demonstration of a single-particle interferometer opens the door to a number of applications, from investigations of gravity to surface impact physics.

New calculations determine the minimum cost of making a quantum measurement.

The combination of several quantum states that are local can yield a nonlocal state.

Microwave signals in an entangled state can be generated and then spatially separated on a single chip, enabling quantum communication with microwave technology.

Researchers propose how to realize time crystals, structures whose lowest-energy states are periodic both in time and space.

David Wineland and Serge Haroche, who studied photons and atoms in new ways, have won the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physics.

A new optical experiment provides further proof that quantum mechanics is not hiding some classical framework beneath its veneer of context-dependent observations.

Existing or planned electron accelerators may be able to see the breakdown of general relativity.

Researchers demonstrate a scheme that allows counting up to 100 atoms in a given quantum state, which may enable high precision measurements with entangled states.

A proposed interferometry experiment could detect quantum states, called anyons, which are neither bosons nor fermions.

State of the art quantum measurements show that the original formulation of Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle can be violated.