MIT physics

At the heart of a far-off galaxy, a supermassive black hole appears to have had a case of the hiccups. Astronomers from MIT, Italy, the Czech Republic, and elsewhere have found that a previously quiet black…

If there is life in the solar system beyond Earth, it might be found in the clouds of Venus. In contrast to the planet’s blisteringly inhospitable surface, Venus’ cloud layer, which extends from 30 to 40 miles…

Of the more than 5,000 planets known to exist beyond our solar system, most orbit their stars at surprisingly close range. More than 80 percent of confirmed exoplanets have orbits shorter than 50 days, placing…

The search for space-shaking ripples in the universe just got a big boost. An MIT-led effort to build a bigger, better gravitational-wave detector will receive $9 million dollars over the next three years from…

The MIT School of Science has announced nine postdocs and research scientists as recipients of the 2024 Infinite Expansion Award, which highlights extraordinary members of the MIT community. The following are…

The electron is the basic unit of electricity, as it carries a single negative charge. This is what we’re taught in high school physics, and it is overwhelmingly the case in most materials in nature. But in very…

Can a government promote morality? How much trust should people place in their government? Such fundamental questions of political philosophy and ethics intrigue Leela Fredlund, a senior majoring in political science and physics. She…

In most materials, heat prefers to scatter. If left alone, a hotspot will gradually fade as it warms its surroundings. But in rare states of matter, heat can behave as a wave, moving back and forth somewhat like…

Star-shredding black holes are everywhere in the sky if you just know how to look for them. That’s one message from a new study by MIT scientists, appearing today in the Astrophysical Journal. The study’s…

By clocking the speed of stars throughout the Milky Way galaxy, MIT physicists have found that stars further out in the galactic disk are traveling more slowly than expected compared to stars that are closer to…

Anthony Badea got hooked on physics during his senior of high school in Irvine, California. He used to fall asleep watching interviews and speeches by public figures in science like astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and string theorist…

Vilhelm Lee Andersen Woltz, who goes by Billy, sits by the outdoor track at MIT on a New England fall day. It’s cold, gray, and misty, but it’s nothing compared to the weather during his most cherished personal…

Electrons move through a conducting material like commuters at the height of Manhattan rush hour. The charged particles may jostle and bump against each other, but for the most part they’re unconcerned with other…

Although he has operated MIT’s nuclear research reactor and worked as an intern for a national energy laboratory, senior Olorunsola “Jerry” Akinsulire never seems happier than when he's demonstrating the use of…

Ordinary pencil lead holds extraordinary properties when shaved down to layers as thin as an atom. A single, atom-thin sheet of graphite, known as graphene, is just a tiny fraction of the width of a human hair.…

Five MIT professors have been selected to receive the 2023 Simons Investigators awards from the Simons Foundation. Virginia Vassilevska Williams and Vinod Vaikuntanathan are both professors in MIT’s Department of…

MIT professor of physics Wolfgang Ketterle was named one of 10 recipients of the 2023 Class of Vannevar Bush Faculty Fellowships by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). Ketterle will use his award of up to $3…