Pulses of laser light can cause any material – including insulators – to develop a relatively large magnetic moment. This effect, which has been demonstrated for the first time by an international team of researchers, shows that laser light can induce quantum behaviour even at room temperature, not just under the extremely cold conditions usually required. While primarily of interest for fundamental science, the technique could also have applications for faster, more efficient magnetic data storage. In their experiments, Stefano Bonetti of Stockholm University and the Ca’ Foscari University of ..read more

New observations of the flavour composition of atmospheric neutrinos have revealed no conclusive evidence for the minuscule, short-lived black holes that have been predicted by some theories of quantum gravity. The study was done by researchers using the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole and the result places some of the tightest constraints ever on the nature of quantum gravity. Developing a viable theory of quantum gravity is one of the greatest challenges in physics. Today, gravity is described very well by Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity, which is incompatible w ..read more

Eager explorer Florence Downs enjoys showcasing the opportunities of engineering to young people. (Courtesy: Florence Downs)What skills do you use every day in your job? As an editor, the largest part of my job is doing just that – editing. Most broadly, I spend my time working out how to communicate a story as clearly as possible to the reader. A lot of the time that might just involve a bit of rearrangement and grammatical wrangling. Sometimes it calls for more of a rewrite, and the writer in me can’t help but get excited for those moments. I write shorter pieces for the magazine too, so am ..read more

The oncology information system (OIS) lies at the heart of all cancer care, managing the entire clinical pathway – from patient registration, to treatment scheduling and delivery, to follow-up. The software revolution has transformed cancer care from paper-based charts and records to today’s fully digitized processes. But an OIS can do so much more: it can collect data to analyse and learn from, automate tasks and data processing, and intuitively guide users to the information that they need. A case in point is RayCare, the OIS from oncology software specialist RaySearch Laboratories. RayCare ..read more

In a proof-of-concept study, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) used a smartphone’s built-in magnetometer, combined with hydrogels that change their shape in response to specific cues, to measure sugar concentrations in beverages. The platform, they say, could potentially be used to measure glucose in biological samples, detect environmental toxins, or even test the pH of liquids in an at-home brewery. That a smartphone can be used as a compass is thanks to its magnetometer, which measures the Earth’s magnetic field (or a local source of magnetism) in thre ..read more

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast explores how the medical physics community is embracing environmental sustainability. Our guests are the medical physicists Rob Chuter of the Christie NHS Foundation Trust in the UK and Kari Tanderup of Aarhus University in Denmark. They chat with Physics World’s Tami Freeman about the environmental impact of healthcare provision – and how the community can reduce its carbon footprint without having negative impacts on health outcomes. This podcast was created in collaboration with IPEM, the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine. IPE ..read more

Today’s measurement systems can get very complicated very quickly. Scientists working at the cutting edge of research will often have to cobble together instruments from a number of different suppliers. This is problematic because mixed-vendor systems can be difficult to operate and this can seriously compromise the accuracy and repeatability of the measurements being made. Lake Shore Cryotronics has addressed these uncertainties with its MeasureReady M81-SSM (Synchronous Source and Measure) system, which allows up to three source and three measurement modules to be simultaneously operated by ..read more

A new theoretical model could solve a 50-year-old puzzle on the entropy of black holes. Developed by physicists in the US, Belgium and Argentina, the model uses the concept of quantum-mechanical wormholes to count the number of quantum microstates within a black hole. The resulting counts agree with predictions made by the so-called Bekenstein-Hawking entropy formula and may lead to a deeper understanding of these extreme astrophysical objects. Black hole thermodynamics Black holes get their name because their intense gravity warps space-time so much that not even light can escape after enteri ..read more

Individual polyatomic molecules have been trapped in arrays of optical tweezers for the first time. Researchers in the US were able to control individual quantum states of the three-atom molecules and the technique could find applications in quantum computing and searches for physics beyond the Standard Model. Cooling molecules to temperatures near absolute zero is an exciting frontier in ultracold physics because it provides a window into how chemical processes are driven by quantum mechanics. For decades, physicists have been cooling atoms to ultracold temperatures. However, molecules are mu ..read more

Oil and water famously don’t mix – at least, not without adding a surfactant such as soap to coax them into a stable combination. Now, however, researchers in France and US have turned this conventional wisdom on its head by showing that they can, in fact, mix without a surfactant. The finding could have wide-reaching implications for industries that make heavy use of such mixtures, including food, cosmetics, health, paints and packaging to name just a few. A mixture of two immiscible liquids such as water and oil is known as an emulsion. When an emulsion is shaken vigorously, one of its compo ..read more