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Physics

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Measuring Smokestack Emissions Accurately

November 23, 2015

Society is increasingly concerned about exactly how much carbon dioxide and other pollutants are coming out of smokestacks. But current measurements are clouded...

RFPs: The Best and the Brightest

November 20, 2015

How, precisely, does disease begin and progress in a single cell? To fully understand such processes on the smallest scales, scientists need a way to peer deep...

On the Road to a Neutron Microscope: First Light for World-Class Neutron Imaging Facility

November 20, 2015

Neutrons, the charge-less constituents of atomic nuclei, are nifty imagers. Since the 1950s, scientists have been using these particles' eerie ability to non...

How NIST Detected Spooky Actions at a Distance

November 10, 2015

This graphic describes how researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) used pairs of light particles to perform a "Bell test,"...

NIST physicist Krister Shalm with the photon source used in the Bell test

NIST Team Proves 'Spooky Action at a Distance' is Really Real

November 10, 2015

BOULDER, Colo.—Einstein was wrong about at least one thing: There are, in fact, "spooky actions at a distance," as now proven by researchers at the National...

It's a Beauty: JILA's Quantum Crystal is Now More Valuable

November 5, 2015

Physicists at JILA have made their "quantum crystal" of ultracold molecules more valuable than ever by packing about five times more molecules into it. The...

New Ballistics Control Chart for Forensic Imaging

October 28, 2015

You've probably seen it on TV: To determine whether a single weapon was used in multiple crimes, forensics labs run images of a spent bullet through a database...

Measuring Optical Power with Single-Photon Detectors

October 27, 2015

Precise measurements of optical power enable activities from fiber-optic communications to laser manufacturing and biomedical imaging — anything requiring a...

Fundamental Constants: The Latest . . . and the Last?

October 26, 2015

In a world of incessant change, some things have to stay the same. One is the set of values for the fundamental physical constants – such as the speed of light...

Top-of-the-Atmosphere Sunlight — As Seen from Earth

October 22, 2015

It may seem hard to believe, but we still don't know nearly enough about sunlight. Although people have been splitting the sun's rays into a spectrum and...

A New, World-Class Facility for Infrared Calibrations

October 21, 2015

NIST is about to open the world's most accurate facility for calibrating infrared (IR) detectors. It is made possible by the establishment of an extremely...

cobalt disk (red) atop a thin cobalt-palladium film (light purple background)

NIST, UC Davis Scientists Float New Approach to Creating Computer Memory

October 8, 2015

What can skyrmions do for you? These ghostly quantum rings, heretofore glimpsed only under extreme laboratory conditions, just might be the basis for a new type...

NIST Calibrates Quartz Crystals for Fusion Device

September 29, 2015

Last spring, PML's x-ray calibration facilities were used in a pinch – a Z pinch, that is. The Sandia National Laboratories' Z Pulsed Power Facility, or "Z...

Quantum Simulation: Physics at the Edge

September 25, 2015

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have achieved a major milestone in simulating the dynamics of condensed-matter systems –...

NIST Puts the Twist on Neutrons — Because It Takes One to Know One

September 23, 2015

A team of scientists working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has found a way to put a twist on a beam of neutrons—a development...

NIST Team Breaks Distance Record for Quantum Teleportation

September 22, 2015

BOULDER, Colo.—Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have "teleported" or transferred quantum information carried in light...

GaN Nanowires: Knowing Which End Is Up

September 21, 2015

Many people who have heard of gallium nitride (GaN) know it as the semiconductor used in bright light-emitting diodes for flashlights and energy-efficient light...

Hydrogen Storage Formulation Patented

September 21, 2015

The prospect of a "hydrogen economy" – in which vehicles powered by fuel cells would travel the nation's roadways emitting nothing from their tailpipes but...

SPS Interns Get the NIST Experience

September 17, 2015

It's not every day that undergraduate students contribute in a meaningful way to research at a national lab in the span of a few weeks. But that's what happened...

NIST Physicists Show 'Molecules' Made of Light May Be Possible

September 8, 2015

It's not lightsaber time, not yet. But a team including theoretical physicists from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has taken another...

Four images showing circular grating for extracting single photons from a quantum dot

NIST Method for Spotting Quantum Dots Could Help Make High-Performance Nanophotonic Devices

August 10, 2015

Life may be as unpredictable as a box of chocolates, but ideally, you always know what you're going to get from a quantum dot. A quantum dot should produce one...

New Shellfish Reference Material Will Help Monitor Oceans' Radioactive Contamination

August 4, 2015

A new reference material that will help laboratories accurately measure radioactive contamination in seawater is now available from the National Institute of...

Gaily Tread the [Quantum] Measure

July 28, 2015

Since quantum theory has been known to borrow from the arts—Murray Gell-Mann famously named "quarks" after a line from James Joyce—it's only fitting that...

NIST to Host First App Challenge to Improve Data Access

July 27, 2015

Researchers looking for information on the properties of methane at high temperatures or the isotopic composition of an element know they can rely on standard...

Hand holding a flexible organic material

NIST Shows Organic Solar Industry Something New Under the Sun

July 16, 2015

Hunting for the best material from which to build organic solar cells can be like seeking the proverbial haystack needle, but now scientists at the National...

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