Menu

Blog

Archive for the ‘physics’ category: Page 271

Sep 9, 2016

Breaking Newton’s Third Law: Impossible Space Engine ‘The EMdrive’ Passes Peer Review

Posted by in categories: physics, space travel

The EmDrive is a new type of rocket engine first proposed by British scientist/electrical engineer Roger Shawyer in 1999. Unlike conventional space rocket engines, the EmDrive doesn’t require any kind of propellant (also known as a reaction mass) to make propulsion possible, and hence partially disobeying Newton’s Third Law: “To each action there’s an equal and opposite reaction”.

Despite the fact that this seems to violate the known laws of physics, a prototype device was submitted to NASA’s Eagleworks lab for testing which came back positive, reports Digital Trends.

Continue reading “Breaking Newton’s Third Law: Impossible Space Engine ‘The EMdrive’ Passes Peer Review” »

Sep 9, 2016

Time crystals might exist after all

Posted by in categories: energy, mathematics, physics

(Phys.org)—Are time crystals just a mathematical curiosity, or could they actually physically exist? Physicists have been debating this question since 2012, when Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek first proposed the idea of time crystals. He argued that these hypothetical objects can exhibit periodic motion, such as moving in a circular orbit, in their state of lowest energy, or their “ground state.” Theoretically, objects in their ground states don’t have enough energy to move at all.

In the years since, other physicists have proposed various arguments for why the physical existence of is impossible—and most physicists do seem to think that time crystals are physically impossible because of their odd properties. Even though time crystals couldn’t be used to generate useful energy (since disturbing them makes them stop moving), and don’t violate the second law of thermodynamics, they do violate a fundamental of the laws of physics.

However, now in a new paper published in Physical Review Letters, physicists from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and Microsoft Station Q (a Microsoft research lab located on the UCSB campus) have demonstrated that it may be possible for time crystals to physically exist.

Read more

Sep 6, 2016

These Nanobots Can Repair Circuits All by Themselves

Posted by in categories: computing, nanotechnology, physics, robotics/AI

A new technique uses the curious physical laws of the nano-scale itself to “program” nanobots. Welcome to the future of nanotechnology.

Nanorobotics has long been touted as one of the most promising “miracle technologies” of the future. But one of the fundamental problems with such extreme miniaturization is how to “program” nanobots—after all, you can’t very well shrink computer circuitry to fit within nanometer-scale technology.

Continue reading “These Nanobots Can Repair Circuits All by Themselves” »

Sep 4, 2016

According to Einstein Time is an Illusion, and Here is the Proof

Posted by in categories: neuroscience, physics

Albert Einstein was very clear in his day. Physicists are very clear now. Time is not absolute, despite what common sense tells you and me.

Time is relative, and flexible and, according to Einstein, “the dividing line between past, present, and future is an illusion”. So reality is ultimately TIMELESS. This sounds pretty bizarre from the view of classical physics, but from the view of consciousness theory and spirituality, it fits in perfectly.

Continue reading “According to Einstein Time is an Illusion, and Here is the Proof” »

Sep 2, 2016

NASA’s Impossible Space Engine, The EMdrive, Passes Peer Review (But That Doesn’t Mean It Works)

Posted by in categories: physics, space travel

If the engine causes thrust with no reaction, and it’s been independently verified, have we truly broken the laws of physics?

Read more

Aug 31, 2016

‘Star in a jar’ could lead to limitless fusion energy

Posted by in categories: energy, physics, space

A test cell for the National Spherical Torus Experiment Upgrade with tokamak in the center. (credit: Elle Starkman/PPPL Office of Communications)

Physicists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) are building a “star in a jar” — a miniature version of the how our Sun creates energy through fusion. It could provide humankind with near limitless energy, ending dependence on fossil fuels for generating electricity — without contributing greenhouse gases that warm the Earth, and with no long-term radioactive waste.

But that requires a “jar” that can contain superhot plasma — and is low-cost enough to be built around the world. A model for such a “jar,” or fusion device, already exists in experimental form: the tokamak, or fusion reactor. Invented in the 1950s by Soviet physicists, it’s a device that uses a powerful magnetic field to confine plasma (superhot charged gas) in the shape of a torus.

Continue reading “‘Star in a jar’ could lead to limitless fusion energy” »

Aug 31, 2016

Physics Confronts Its Heart of Darkness

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

Cracks are showing in the dominant explanation for dark matter. Is there anything more plausible to replace it?

By Lee Billings on August 31, 2016

Read more

Aug 30, 2016

A new study looks for the cortical conscious network

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, mathematics, neuroscience, physics

New research published in the New Journal of Physics tries to decompose the structural layers of the cortical network to different hierarchies enabling to identify the network’s nucleus, from which our consciousness could emerge.

The is a very complex network, with approximately 100 billion neurons and 100 trillion synapses between the neurons. In order to cope with its enormous complexity and to understand how brain function eventually creates the conscious mind, science uses advanced mathematical tools. Ultimately, scientists want to understand how a global phenomenon such as consciousness can emerge from our neuronal network.

A team of physicists from Bar Ilan University in Israel led by Professor Shlomo Havlin and Professor Reuven Cohen used network theory in order to deal with this complexity and to determine how the structure of the human cortical network can support complex data integration and . The gray area of the human cortex, the neuron cell bodies, were scanned with MRI imaging and used to form 1000 in the cortical network. The white matter of the human cortex, the neuron bundles, were scanned with DTI imaging, forming 15,000 links or edges that connected the network’s nodes. In the end of this process, their network was an approximation of the structure of the human cortex.

Read more

Aug 29, 2016

Could Black Holes Give Birth to ‘Planck Stars’?

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics, singularity

Theoretical physicists may have stumbled onto a solution to the black hole “information paradox” — what if a black hole’s singularity isn’t an infinitely dense point in space-time? Continue reading →

Read more

Aug 29, 2016

250Gbps: Russian scientists aim to revolutionize computing with plasma-driven antennas

Posted by in categories: computing, physics

A team of Russian physicists has found a way to tune silicon nanoparticles so they can process optical data at previously unattainable speed, paving the way for the creation of “ultracompact and ultrafast” processing devices.

The findings of the experiment-based survey conducted by scientists from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) and ITMO University were published in the ACS Photonics journal in late July.

Read more