This is all covered by Isaac Newton’s third law of motion, which is one of physics’ most familiar rules: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. But physicists in China have now ...

Physics is supposed to be predictable. Drop a ball, and gravity pulls it down. Heat water, and it boils. Light travels in straight lines. Yet throughout history, scientists have encountered ...

Physics experiments have changed the world irrevocably, altering our reality and enabling us to take gigantic leaps in technology. From ancient times to now, here's a look at some of the greatest ...

I had a conversation like this with a colleague. "They say that if you fly at a speed close to the speed of light, the flow ...

A device that can detect particles arriving from space does not necessarily require a multimillion-dollar laboratory. A ...

Ultrashort laser pulses can be used to generate X-rays. Normally, however, only certain specific frequencies are produced. A team from TU Wien and the University of California San Diego has developed ...

Researchers from Skoltech and the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics have developed an approach that helps optimize the parameters of a laser-plasma source of attosecond pulses—ultrashort ...

For the first time, a quantum radiation reaction in strong electromagnetic fields has been demonstrated experimentally by allowing electrons to collide with an extremely intense and powerful laser ...

Thomas Young, born 250 years ago this week, was a polymath who made seminal contributions in fields from physics to Egyptology. But perhaps his most enduring legacy is proving Isaac Newton wrong about ...

The most beautiful experiment in physics, according to a poll of Physics World readers, is the interference of single electrons in a Young’s double slit. Robert P Crease reports Simply beautiful – the ...

A 'magnet' where the North and South poles are always a set. No matter how small you cut it, both always appear, and it is a fundamental rule of physics that magnets with 'only an N pole' or 'only an ...