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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).

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:Even the description is AI written. (Score 1) 147

this... tracks.

I've been using Claude Code at work for a low-stakes project so that my company sees me being all "AI forward" and stuff (They're really drinking the Kool-aid) and yeah I'll admit its been doing OK on the project.... and yeah I see where you're coming from, there is a certain prose about how it outlines/summarizes things that feels familiar here.

I would really like a true new browser that doesn't use WebKit, Chromium or Gecko (and don't get me started on Goana) but I question such a tiny team being able to do so securely and in a manner that is actually maintainable. I WANT it to be true but I have my concerns and the AI summary thing just kind of puts the icing on the cake.

Comment Re:Well above the ocean [Re:Uh HUH] (Score 1) 83

Let me be perfectly clear about this: I am insulting you. I am calling you out as either being such a plonk that you keep old copies of People magazine around just in case ... or you are such a plonk that you google and select the answer you want.

Either way, you are a plonk. Your memory is reliable and truthful, mine is full of lies.

Comment Re:Well above the ocean [Re:Uh HUH] (Score 1) 83

That's not how it was reported at the time, and I have no reason to trust People magazine.

If you were an anti-alarmist, you'd be crowing this shows sea levels dropping.

For another indication of how sloppy sea level rise claims are, the alarmists published a list of sea level changes along the US Atlantic coast, and funny thing, they differed considerably, as if the ocean were rising more in some places than others. The alternative explanation of sinking land levels was pooh poohed as climate denialism. But another funny thing: California's central valley was once reported as having sunk 22 feet since the gold rush days 150 years earlier, due to pumping out so much underground water. Gosh, could the same thing be happening along the Atlantic coast?

Comment Record breaking temperatures are a joke (Score -1, Troll) 83

There was a world record high temperature reported in Algeria a few years back. Turns out the weather station was situated at an airport, on or close to the tarmac where jet airplanes shot their hot exhaust at the area.

There are standards for weather stations, such as fresh white paint, size and shape of the containing box, louvers, situated with grass around it, no artificial heat sources nearby, etc etc etc. Something like 90-95% of Britain's weather stations violate those standards, some so badly that they are rated as only being within 5 degrees of correct. Britain was also reporting record high temperatures for weather stations that haven't existed for decades; they average other weather stations within 50 miles to create fake weather station data.

These same patterns show up in the US and other countries. The reported "record high temperatures" are nothing of the sort.

Again: people don't lie like this when they have truth on their side. They not only don't need to, they know that lies ruin their reputations. These alarmists don't seem to mind being caught in such egregious lies. Apparently they don't mind having shit reputations.

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