Volume 6 Issue 12, December 2024

On the centenary of the founding of the Electrical Association for Women, three historians of science and technology reflect on the impact of bringing physics literacy into our daily lives.

Trained as a particle physicist, Yangyang Cheng now works as a researcher on the history of science in China and US–China relations. She contextualizes the current tensions between the two superpowers.

A paper in Physical Review Letters sheds new light on a 40-year-old puzzle, and provides new insights into fluid mechanics.

With its capability to observe faint objects from the distant past, JWST is discovering objects that were thought to be rare; for example, compact objects that appear as little red dots are more than they seem.

A paper in Science Advances provides a mechanics-based explanation for why flightless birds run the way they do.

A paper in Nature Physics puts forward a statistical mechanics theory to explain the risks of not having enough slack in a time-sensitive system.

An article in Nature reports an on-chip titanium:sapphire laser.

This Review discusses quantum optimization, focusing on the potential of exact, approximate and heuristic methods, core algorithmic building blocks, problem classes and benchmarking metrics. The challenges for quantum optimization are considered, and next steps are suggested for progress towards achieving quantum advantage.

Three-dimensional, quantum mixtures of ultracold gases of neutral atoms are ideal platforms for probing the physics of many-body systems because the interparticle interactions can be fine-tuned externally. This Review introduces a range of active topics under investigation: topological defects, the interplay of superconductivity and magnetism, novel few-body states and more.

Nitrogen vacancy centre quantum sensors are quantitative, non-invasive and physically robust probes of condensed matter systems that offer nanoscale resolution across a wide range of temperatures. This Technical Review discusses the connections between NV measurements and important physical characteristics in condensed matter.

This Perspective surveys the role of thermal nonlinearity in figures of merit through a multiscale physical understanding to advance heat harvesting technologies beyond linear processes, focusing on ‘nonlinear heat harvesting’, which potentially contributes to sustainable energy transition and decarbonization goals.