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Submission + - First Nuclear Clocks Start Ticking in Vienna and Beijing (phys.org)

Submitted by necro81
necro81 writes: Two groups, one in Vienna and one in Beijing, have successfully demonstrated the world's first nuclear clocks. Standard atomic clocks, like the caesium clocks that define the second, operate by observing the transition of electrons between different orbits about the nucleus. The resulting radiation is usually in the microwave range, and can produce clocks accurate to one second in 100 billion years.

Nuclear clocks go a step further, and probe energy transitions within the nucleus itself. Nuclei can arrange their protons and neutrons into different configurations, called isomers. The isomer with the lowest energy is the one usually found; higher-energy ones are only metastable and decay quickly. Usually it takes serious energy — x-rays and gamma rays — to excite a nucleus into a higher-energy arrangement. It so happens that thorium-229 can be excited using UV light with a wavelength of 148 nm — just within the capabilities of some exotic lasers.

It's still been quite a challenge. For one thing, Th-229 is not found in nature; it must be extracted from the decay chain of uranium-235. The Beijing team used just a microgram mixed in a crystal of calcium fluoride.

Although these prototype nuclear clocks are not yet more accurate than existing atomic clocks (one second in millions, rather than billions, of years), they show the way towards what may be possible. Because the energy transition is in the nucleus, rather than the electron cloud, it is less susceptible to outside disturbances like magnetic fields. And the fundamental frequency is much higher (five orders of magnitude), which should yield more precise timing. This development could lead to smaller and more reliable time standards across the world (and solar system).

Comment Re:Fundamental physics has never been more dead (Score 2) 39

by dargaud (#66366394) Attached to: Francis Halzen Wins Nobel Physics Prize For Antarctic 'Ghost Particle' Hunt
You seem very angry... A nobel prize in penguin country should make any self-respecting Linux nerd happy !
Anyway, this observatory doesn't just prove that neutrino exist, we already knew that as you mention, but it is also highly directional and can build a map of sources. The JWST is very noce, yes, but it only take *better* pictures than previously. This allows for an entirely new view on the universe, in the same groundbreaking way as the gravity wave detectors. A few years ago everything we knew about the universe was from photons: radio, optics, then UV, IR, gamma, etc... but still electromagnetic. Then we build (I built !!!) cosmic ray detectors. And now neutrinos and a few others. It's great.

Comment Re:Aux port - how could it even technically pause? (Score 1) 42

by bill_mcgonigle (#66366272) Attached to: Alexa Can't Control the AUX Input On Amazon Echo Speakers Anymore

I don't know the protocol but old phone headsets had a 2.5 or 3.5mm jack with an extra ring that got you play/pause/hook/next/last.

Hypothetically that could have been implemented. I had a collection of Alexas that got binned as soon as they got caught spying for police so I never got that far. ESP32 is better for nerds anyway.

One thing Australia does right is a statute naming removal of features as a violation of contract requiring full refunds in these circumstances.

Submission + - Wisconsin U–Madison Prof Francis Halzen named 2026 Nobel laureate in physi (wisc.edu)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: Halzen is the principal investigator of the NSF IceCube Neutrino Observatory, the world’s largest — and perhaps strangest — telescope. The U.S. National Science Foundation-funded observatory is operated by an international collaboration of scientists led by the Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center based at UW–Madison.

Embedded in a cubic kilometer of Antarctic ice, IceCube uses thousands of light sensors to survey the universe for neutrinos, nearly massless particles that rarely interact with other matter. Neutrinos provide information about the workings of black holes, galaxies and other objects in the cosmos.

“IceCube is like no other telescope in the world,” says UW–Madison interim Chancellor Eric M. Wilcots. “And there is no other scientist quite like Francis Halzen, whose idea to create a neutrino detector under almost a mile of ice has led to a remarkable multinational and multi-institutional scientific collaboration and a fundamental shift in how we think about the universe.”

Comment Re:If they are thermally efficient enough (Score 1) 122

by bill_mcgonigle (#66361220) Attached to: Google Tests AI Data Center In Space

Stupid and malicious are different.

The offered narrative is "let us build the data center AI control grid now because it's only temporary until we can move it to space".

You and I both know that's not thermodynamically possible with known science.

So do the people saying it.

We have a real problem with Positive Projection where we are decent folks so we project that on people who are not. That is an error even though most people are decent folks. The parasites are not.

I only recent learned that Hanlon's Razor comes from a humor book about Murphy's Law from the early 80's. It's not some ancient axiom of wisdom - it is used by the Cluster B disordered to mask their nefarious deeds.

If you talk about this with most people these days you'll get the Positive Projection script executed like an autorun.

Everybody should turn off autorun whenever possible. Major risk.

Comment Re:We're probably going to find more (Score -1) 34

by bill_mcgonigle (#66361208) Attached to: 1 In 8 Cancer Cases Worldwide Are Due to Infections

> Gardasil

It's sold as an "HPV vaccine" but it only targets about 4% of HPV viruses, specifically the ones most likely to cause cervical cancer in women in their 40's. It's described in the Merck literature.

Not even the HPV most likely to cause throat cancer in men (usually acquired from lady parts).

If cancer treatment advances at the current rate (AI discovery docs estimate 9 years for the supermajority) it's possible that the Gardasil fatalities will have killed more teens than prevented deaths of women.

It's like a Drake Equation for cancer - the coefficients will determine the narrative either positive or negative. This is where free choice is ethically mandated.

Unfortunately there is considerable religious fervor about such things so very few people wants to scientifically discuss nuances.

Comment Re:Constructive responses anyone? (Score 2) 70

Why isn't EU sponsoring specific features and fixes it needs?

Or assign some of their own developers to submit pull requests.

Or hire *some Europeans* who are unemployed because their war is killing industry.

Let's hear from their project manager instead of faceless wankers and the people responsible for sales.

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I'm still waiting for the advent of the computer science groupie.

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