Physics
Category archives for Physics
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Particle collisions aren’t the easiest thing in the world to explain, but one of our physicists took this challenge to the extreme. In another Ten Hundred Words of Science submission, Brookhaven Lab physicist Paul Sorenson explains his work studying quark-gluon plasma with the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. Where I work, we slam together small things to break them…
Gluon Walls: A New Form of Matter?
Posted by Karen McNulty Walsh on January 10, 2013 
We sat down with Brookhaven theoretical physicist Raju Venugopalan for a conversation about “color glass condensate” and the structure of visible matter in the universe. Q. We’ve heard a lot recently about a “new form of matter” possibly seen at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Europe — a state of saturated gluons called “color…
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The positive and sometimes unexpected impact of particle physics is well documented, from physicists inventing the World Wide Web to engineering the technology underlying life-saving magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) devices. But sometimes the raw power of huge experiments and scientific ambition draw the recognition of those seeking only the most extreme and impractical achievements on…
The Future of Subatomic Glue-Gazing
Posted by Karen McNulty Walsh on June 14, 2012 
RHIC, the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven Lab, found it first: a “perfect” liquid of strongly interacting quarks and gluons – a quark-gluon plasma (QGP) – produced by slamming heavy ions together at close to the speed of light. The fact that the QGP produced in these particle smashups was a liquid and not…
Imagine looking in the mirror and finding your familiar face reflected back as you’ve always known it. But as you look more closely, as you precisely examine that mirror image, subtle distortions emerge. The glass itself remains flawless, but real and fundamental differences exist between you and the face that lives on the other side…
Brookhaven Lab and the Search for the Higgs
Posted by Karen McNulty Walsh on December 13, 2011 
This guest post was written by Brookhaven Lab physicist Kostas Nikolopoulos. Today’s public seminar at CERN, where the ATLAS and CMS collaborations presented the preliminary results of their searches for the Standard Model (SM) Higgs boson with the full dataset collected during 2011, is a landmark for high-energy physics! The Higgs boson is a still-hypothetical…
Pop Goes the Photomultiplier Tube
Posted by Kendra Snyder on February 8, 2011 How do scientists make glass stronger? Break it. Brookhaven Lab physicists and engineers take this hands-on approach a step further. In order to strengthen the design of glass bulbs known as photomultiplier tubes, the researchers submerge the devices in 500,000 gallons of pressurized water, punch a small hole through their sides, and watch as the…
New Beams Take Flight at RHIC
Posted by Kendra Snyder on October 15, 2010 This guest post is written by Brookhaven physicist Thomas Roser, Chair of the Collider-Accelerator Department. Roser, who earned his Ph.D. from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, worked at the University of Michigan before joining Brookhaven in 1991. Thomas Roser The chain of accelerators that leads into two of Brookhaven’s major research facilities – the…
Catching Early Universe Echoes with BOSS
Posted by Kendra Snyder on September 15, 2010 This guest post is written by BNL cosmologist Anže Slosar. Slosar, who joined Brookhaven’s physics department in 2009, received his Ph.D. from Cambridge University in 2003. He previously worked at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Oxford University, and the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia. Anže Slosar Brookhaven Lab is involved in three cosmology experiments aimed at…
From the Archive: High Fashion Meets High Tech
Posted by Kendra Snyder on August 2, 2010 Silk taffeta, flowing gowns, sheaths, and…a lab coat? It may sound like a fashion faux pas, but these were the makings of NYC-based designer Shin Choi‘s spring 2000 collection. At $378, this lab coat should probably be saved for the most special occasions That season’s catalogue, which recently ended up on my desk after a…
