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The study, published in Physical Review Letters, used historic records between 1962–64 from a research station in Scotland. Scientists compared days with high and low radioactively-generated charge, finding that clouds were visibly thicker, and there was 24% more rain on average on the days with more radioactivity.

Professor Giles Harrison, lead author and Professor of Atmospheric Physics at the University of Reading, said: By studying the radioactivity released from Cold War weapons tests, scientists at the time learnt about atmospheric circulation patterns. We have now reused this data to examine the effect on rainfall.

The politically charged atmosphere of the Cold War led to a nuclear arms race and worldwide anxiety. Decades later, that global cloud has yielded a silver lining, in giving us a unique way to study how electric charge affects rain.

Theoretical physics video nominated for international award.

A West Vancouver student may have the keys to interstellar travel. He just needs a few votes and a whole lot of mass.

Continue reading “West Vancouver student video explains how we could warp to Alpha Centauri” »

Mysterious effects in a new generation of dark matter detectors could herald a revolutionary discovery.

I drove 1,800 miles in a Hydrogen Fuel Cell Car! Thanks to Toyota for sponsoring this video and lending us the 2021 #Mirai.

Upcoming videos in this series:
Hydrogen vs. Battery Electric.
Grid Energy Storage.
Concentrated Solar.

Continue reading “The Truth about Driving a Hydrogen Car” »

The huge “dog-boned” asteroid hurling through the solar system has now been imaged in unprecedented detail.

A team of astronomers has seemingly obtained the best pictures and data to date of the peculiar asteroid, Kleopatra. Using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), observers from the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, and the Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille, France, captured images to help two teams of scientists answer some interesting questions.

“Kleopatra is truly a unique body in our Solar System,” says Franck Marchis, who led a study on the asteroid published in Astronomy & Astrophysics. “Science makes a lot of progress thanks to the study of weird outliers. I think Kleopatra is one of those and understanding this complex, multiple asteroid system can help us learn more about our Solar System.”

Continue reading “Astronomers take best pictures of Kleopatra’s ‘portrait’” »

Optical lattice clocks could help scientists detect gravitational waves, hunt for dark matter and much more.

Two physicists just snagged $3 million for helping develop a super-precise clock that could allow scientists to study and explore the universe like never before.

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley have outlined details of an optical antenna they claim could provide almost limitless bandwidth.

They suggest the key to the breakthrough is a method of being able to take full advantage of the orbital angular momentum (OAM) properties of a coherent light source, thus enabling multiplexing, or simultaneous transmission.

According to Boubacar Kante, the principal investigator of the Berkeley project “it is the first time that lasers producing twisted light have been directly multiplexed.” He is an associate professor in the university’s Electronic Engineering and Computer Sciences Department, and the initial results of the work have just been published in Nature Physics.

Jeff Falk 713−348−6775 jfalk@rice.edu

Jade Boyd 713−348−6778 jadeboyd@rice.edu

HOUSTON – (Sept. 1 2021) – Rice physicists have confirmed the topological origins of magnons, magnetic features they discovered three years ago in a 2D material that could prove useful for encoding information in the spins of electrons.

The Moon’s lack of atmosphere and darkness could offers unique observations of the universe.