With the 2024 Paris Olympics just days away, sports fans are braced to see who will run, jump, row, fight and dance themselves into the history books. One of the most exciting moments will be the 100m sprint finals, when athletes compete to become the fastest man or woman on Earth. Over the years we have seen jaw-dropping performances from the likes of Usain Bolt and Florence Griffith-Joyner. Scientists have been captivated by top sprinters – trying to understand how physique, technique and nutritional intake can help athletes push the limits of human ability. In this episode of the Physics Wo ..read more

For sports fans, the next few weeks will bring excitement and drama. The Euro 2024 football (soccer) tournament is under way in Germany and the Copa América is about to kick off in the US. Then at the end of July, the Olympics starts in Paris as athletes from across the world compete to run, jump, sail, cycle and dance themselves into the history books. In this episode of Physics World Stories, you will hear from two US physicists with a profound connection with sport. The first guest is John Eric Goff of the University of Lynchburg, author of Gold Medal Physics: the Science of Sports. After t ..read more

Whether you’re a Swiftie, a devout metalhead, or a 1980s synth pop aficionado, there is something for every musical taste in this month’s Physics World Stories. In part one, podcast host Andrew Glester is joined by Jacqueline Caplan-Auerbach, a geophysicist at Western Washington University, US. She has analysed “Swift quakes”, a seismological phenomenon during Taylor Swift’s Eras tour, answering two important questions. Are the quakes triggered by the music or the crowd? And how does their magnitude compare with similar events like the 2011 “Beast quake” triggered by celebrations at an America ..read more

This episode of Physics World Stories explores the science, politics and ethics in the Netflix series 3 Body Problem. Adapted from the celebrated Chinese novel The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin, the multi-layered story centres around humanity’s first contact with an alien civilization. As the drama unfolds, with physicists among its lead protagonists, the plot navigates the challenges of communicating with aliens across interstellar space – and the inevitable tensions that arise on Earth. To discuss 3 Body Problem, podcast host Andrew Glester is joined by three special guests: Matt Kenzie ..read more

This month’s episode of Physics World Stories features an interview with composer Amanda Lee Falkenberg with music from The Moons Symphony. Her creation takes listeners on an epic journey through the science and stories of the moons of our solar system. The seven-movement symphony dramatises the geophysical features of Io, Europa, Titan, Enceladus, Miranda, Ganymede, before turning to our own Moon for two-part finale. In creating the work, Australian born Amanda Lee Falkenberg immersed herself in the scientific research and consulted many scientists and astronauts. The Moons Symphony performed ..read more

Coke or Pepsi? Messi or Ronaldo? Taylor Swift or…well, without wanting to set the Swifties against Physics World, let’s just say there’s often a tribal element to who we support or the choices we make. In the world of cosmology, one heated divide is whether you’re for dark matter or modified Newtonian dynamics (MOND). Both theories attempt to explain the discrepancies between the predicted gravitational effects in the universe and some of the actual observed motions of stars and galaxies. In the latest episode of Physics World Stories, Andrew Glester speaks to two cosmologists on opposing side ..read more

In the latest Physics World Stories podcast, astrophysicist Emma Chapman is in conversation with host Andrew Glester about the history of radio astronomy. It’s a field that has always maintained a do-it-yourself ethic, with valuable contributions from people outside the established academic community. Chapman, an astrophysicist at the University of Nottingham in the UK is the author of the popular-science book First Light: Switching on Stars at the Dawn of Time. Alongside her research, Chapman regularly visits amateur radio astronomy clubs and admires the technical expertise she encounter ..read more

Over the past half century, laser cooling has revolutionized atomic, molecular and optical physics. Laser cooling of atoms and ions has enabled dramatic leaps in the precision of atomic clocks, allowing new tests of fundamental physics and potential improvements in clock-based navigation via the Global Positioning System. Now it is also laying the foundations for quantum computing with atoms and ions. In this episode of Physics World Stories, you can enjoy a vibrant tour through the history of laser cooling with Chad Orzel, a popular-science author and researcher at Union College in the US, wh ..read more

This episode of the Physics World Stories podcast features an interview with Kai Bird, co-author of the book that inspired the recent blockbuster film Oppenheimer, directed by Christopher Nolan. Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in Biography, American Prometheus: the Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer is an exploration of the brilliant and enigmatic physicist who led the project to develop the world’s first atomic weapons. Oppenheimer is a fascinating but complicated character for a biographer to tackle. Despite excelling in his leadership of the Manhattan Project, Oppenheimer’s cons ..read more

Energy accounts for more than three-quarters of our greenhouse gas emissions globally each year. That’s not surprising, given the role of energy in almost every aspect of modern life. To stand any chance of hitting net zero climate targets, we need to accelerate the transition to greener forms of energy generation. In this episode of the Physics World Stories podcast, Andrew Glester explores two novel forms of renewable energy generation, both with the potential to scale and not suffer from issues of intermittency. First up, Nicol Kaplin speaks about SOLARIS, an ambitious ESA project investiga ..read more