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When an international collaboration of physicists came up with a result that punched a hole in Einstein's theory of special relativity and couldn't find any mistakes in their work, they asked the world to take a second look at their experiment.

A group of three researchers from KEK, Shizuoka University and Osaka University has for the first time revealed the way our universe was born with 3 spatial dimensions from 10-dimensional superstring theory in which spacetime has 9 spatial directions and 1 temporal direction.

Optical techniques enable us to examine single molecules, but do we really understand what we are seeing? After all, the fuzziness caused by effects such as light interference makes these images very difficult to interpret.

(PhysOrg.com) -- In an egg carton of laser light, University of Michigan physicists can trap giant Rydberg atoms with up to 90 percent efficiency, an achievement that could advance quantum computing and terahertz imaging, among other applications.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Microscopic spheres form strings in surprising alignments when suspended in a viscous fluid and sheared between two plates — a finding that will affect the way scientists think about the properties of such wide-ranging substances as shampoo and futuristic computer chips.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers have created a new type of optical device small enough to fit millions on a computer chip that could lead to faster, more powerful information processing and supercomputers.

A group with researchers of the Technical University of Munich, Germany, are the first to plot changes in the Earth's axis through laboratory measurements.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Many physicists around the world are hard at work trying to figure out new and exciting ways to create ultra-cold objects, the reason being is that if a system could be created that operates at or at least very near absolute zero, superconductors could be devised that might help create quantum computers, which would of course run at speeds that would make the current generation look quaint. Plus, theory suggests new states of matter might be discovered.

The University of Delaware's Eric M. Furst authored a commentary in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) advance online edition Dec.

Understanding and visualizing the energy states of electrons in a crystal provides important insights into many modern electronic materials, such as superconductors, or other materials that physicists can use to develop novel electronic applications. The electronic states at the surface of a crystal, or the two-dimensional layers within a sample, are of particular interest to materials scientists, but are notoriously difficult to image using conventional techniques.

While holiday shoppers search frantically for the Moshi Monsters, LeapPad Explorers, or Lalaloopsy Silly Hair dolls atop their children's wish lists, many physicists remain engrossed in the properties of a simple 1940s-era toy -- the Slinky.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers from the University of Birmingham and Lancaster University, analysing data taken by the ATLAS experiment, have been at the centre of what is believed to be the first clear observation of a new particle at the Large Hadron Collider. The research is published today on the online repository arXiv.

Researchers at the Max-Born-Institute, Berlin, Germany, observed the extremely fast onset of electrical resistance in a semiconductor by following electron motions in real-time.

"Quantum Man: Richard Feynman's Life in Science," ASU Foundation Professor and Director of the Origins Project Lawrence M. Krauss' recent book about a legendary and sometimes very public modern physicist, has been chosen as the 2011 Book of the Year by Physics World magazine in the UK.

A fundamental problem that has puzzled generations of scientists has finally been solved after more than 70 years.