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At the Radioactive Isotope Beam Facility (RIBF) of the RIKEN Nishina Center for Accelerator Science in Wako, a research team has measured the time it takes for 38 extremely rare isotopes to decay by half. This is the first study of half-lives for 18 of the isotopes. The data provide a long-awaited test of theoretical predictions of the rate at which these isotopes decay, and will help nuclear physicists to understand a fundamental source of many of the atomic elements and their isotopes

Decades of optimization have made the electronic switch both tiny and efficient.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Titanium oxide doped with cobalt produces magnetic properties at room temperature via a newly discovered mechanism.

A Rice University-led team of physicists this week offered up one of the first theoretical explanations of how two dissimilar types of high-temperature superconductors behave in similar ways.

Optical data carriers such as DVDs, Blu-rays and CD-RWs store data in layers of so-called "phase change materials". In the future, these materials will enable the development of fast, non-volatile and energy-saving main memories. A prerequisite for this is a low thermal conductivity

(PhysOrg.com) -- Physicist Stefano Lepri of the Italian National Research Council and his partner Giulio Casati of the University of Insubria, have published a paper in Physical Review Letters, where they demonstrate through mathematical theory that it should be possible to create asymmetric materials that allow most light or sound waves to pass through in one direction, while mostly preventing them from doing so when going the opposite way.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Like a fish paddles its pectoral fins to swim through water, flying insects use the same physics laws to "paddle" through the air, say Cornell physicists.

For the first time, scientists have an almost complete sky map of high-energy cosmic rays.

Gamma rays are the most energetic type of light wave and can penetrate through lead and other thick containers. A powerful new source of gamma rays will allow officials to search for hidden reactor fuel/nuclear bomb material.

Invisibility appears to be the next possible advance in the use of Terahertz radiation in medicine, security, and communications.

A joint study by academics in Switzerland, Germany and at Boston University sheds new light on the formation of financial bubbles and crashes.

At the Vienna University of Technology, sophisticated atomchips have been used to create pairs of quantum mechanically connected atom-twins. Until now, similar experiments were only possible using photons.

(PhysOrg.com) -- A data memory can hardly be any smaller: researchers working with Gerhard Rempe at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching have stored quantum information in a single atom. The researchers wrote the quantum state of single photons, i.e. particles of light, into a rubidium atom and read it out again after a certain storage time

For many practical applications involving lasers, it's important to be able to control the direction of the laser beams. Just ask Han Solo, or the captain of the Death Star. Researchers from North Carolina State University have come up with a very energy-efficient way of steering laser beams that is precise and relatively inexpensive.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Building a nuclear gamma-ray laser has been a challenge for scientists for a long time, but a new proposal for such a device has overcome some of the most difficult problems.