I promised some science of a less immediately relevant nature, so here we go. You may recall the story of ‘Oumuamua (more formally, 1I/2017 U1), an object which briefly visited our solar system in October of 2017. It was the first time we observed something from outside the solar system pass by, an exciting development all by itself. Even more remarkably, it had an unexpected shape and some surprising moves. Where most objects in space tend towards the spherical, ‘Oumuamua was oblong. And where gravity generally … [Read more...] about Science Corner: Thanks for Swinging By!
simulation
Science Corner: Back to the Present
You don't need a DeLorean to see that this year is going to bring a lot of Back to the Future references and time travel talk. It's fitting, then, that physicists have actually succeeded in constructing a quantum time machine. Well, sort of. (Isn't that always the way with quantum physics?) It turns out, one can create subatomic systems under one set of conditions, and they will also behave as if they were under a different set of conditions. The first intuition is probably to imagine doing something slowly as a way … [Read more...] about Science Corner: Back to the Present