The ultra-sensitive pressure sensor features a 100-nanometre silica sphere held in place by laser light Thomas Penny/Yale Wright Laboratory The pressure produced by a single particle can now be measured for the first time, thanks to a device that uses a tiny bead held in place by a laser. It is so sensitive that researchers…
Stephan Schlamminger and his colleague, Vincent Lee, examine the torsion balance they used to measure the gravitational constant R. Eskalis/NIST For centuries, physicists have been trying to measure the strength of gravity, a number called “big G”. The measurements have never lined up with one another, hinting that either we don’t fully understand our experiments…
Ryan Gosling stars as Ryland Grace in Project Hail Mary Jonathan Olley / Amazon Content Services LLC Part-way through watching Project Hail Mary in a full IMAX theatre, I let out a solitary gasp. Wondering why nobody else was shocked about what I had just seen, I realised it was because I am a physicist….
Machines can help spot mathematical errors Alamy Stock Photo A computer language created to spot errors in mathematical theorems has uncovered a fundamental error in a widely cited physics paper for the first time. The researcher behind the discovery says it is the first physics paper he has analysed in this way, which raises a…
