Stripes in a flowing liquid crystal suggest a route to “chiral” fluids
Study finds chiral structures, with mirror-image configurations, can emerge from nonchiral systems, suggesting new ways to engineer these materials.
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A carbon-lite atmosphere could be a sign of water and life on other terrestrial planets, MIT study finds
A low carbon abundance in planetary atmospheres, which the James Webb Space Telescope can detect, could be a signature of habitability.
MIT researchers observe a hallmark quantum behavior in bouncing droplets
In a study that could help fill some holes in quantum theory, the team recreated a “quantum bomb tester” in a classical droplet test.
MIT engineers design a robotic replica of the heart’s right chamber
The realistic model could aid the development of better heart implants and shed light on understudied heart disorders.
A mineral produced by plate tectonics has a global cooling effect, study finds
An accordion-textured clay called smectite efficiently traps organic carbon and could help buffer global warming over millions of years.
With a quantum “squeeze,” clocks could keep even more precise time, MIT researchers propose
More stable clocks could measure quantum phenomena, including the presence of dark matter.
New laser setup probes metamaterial structures with ultrafast pulses
The LIRAS technique could speed up the development of acoustic lenses, impact-resistant films, and other futuristic materials.
MIT engineers are on a failure-finding mission
The team’s new algorithm finds failures and fixes in all sorts of autonomous systems, from drone teams to power grids.
Physicists trap electrons in a 3D crystal for the first time
The results open the door to exploring superconductivity and other exotic electronic states in three-dimensional materials.
Bright flash leads astronomers to a heavy-metal factory 900 million light years away
Using multiple observatories, astronomers directly detect tellurium in two merging neutron stars.
Wobbly gel mat trains muscle cells to work together
The vibrating platform could be useful for growing artificial muscles to power soft robots and testing therapies for neuromuscular diseases.
Soft optical fibers block pain while moving and stretching with the body
The fibers could help with testing treatments for nerve-related pain.
To excel at engineering design, generative AI must learn to innovate, study finds
AI models that prioritize similarity falter when asked to design something completely new.
From a five-layer graphene sandwich, a rare electronic state emerges
A newly discovered type of electronic behavior could help with packing more data into magnetic memory devices.
MIT design would harness 40 percent of the sun’s heat to produce clean hydrogen fuel
Conventional systems for producing hydrogen depend on fossil fuels, but the new system uses only solar energy.