Imagine shining a flashlight into a material and watching the light bend backward—or in an entirely unexpected direction—as ...

Applied physicists in the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have demonstrated a new way to structure light in custom, repeatable, three-dimensional patterns, ...

CERN's ALICE experiment has resolved the puzzle of deuteron formation, showing that most deuterons form via resonance-driven ...

When a full moon peeks just above the horizon, it appears enormous. This is a curious phenomenon, as when it is at this ...

I test a series of light experiments to explore reflection, refraction, and optical illusions, demonstrating how light behaves in surprising and educational ways. This is what scientists discovered in ...

The constancy of the speed of light is a pillar of modern physics, but questions persist about its absolute universality. Advanced theories, seeking to unify general relativity and quantum mechanics, ...

New experiments at CERN by an international team have ruled out a potential source of intergalactic magnetic fields. The existence of such fields is invoked to explain why we do not observe secondary ...

TL;DR: This experiment may not revolutionize telecommunications, but it highlights how accessible these concepts have become outside traditional research labs. Using nothing more than an iPad, a solar ...

ROCKFORD, Ill. (WTVO) — The Discovery Center Museum is offering an engaging experiment to help children understand the science of light refraction and color mixing as they head back to school. The ...

Dignitaries formally inaugurate the beginning of FLARE operations. From left: Vyacheslav (Slava) Lukin; Hantao Ji, PPPL physicist and FLARE’s principal investigator; Brandon Thorne, director of ...

If you enjoyed this article, I’d like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in ...