Learnin' Corner

  • The Best Clock In the Universe Is Made of Pure Light

    What is a second? You could do the whole "one one thousand" thing and not be terribly far off, and that might be OK for calculating things like how fast you're driving on the highway or how much you should get paid for a certain amount of time worked...

  • Redefining Time

    I’ve always been on board with the idea that a second is exactly a second long. Then along comes a German scientist and my mind is shattered.

  • The Alcubierre Warp Drive

    You probably don’t know what the Alcubierre warp drive is, but that’s cool.

  • Forget Wires, the Future of Electricity Is in 3D Shapes

    _This month’s Learnin’ Corner, courtesy of Motherboard's granddad Vice, is an explanation of topological matter in optical lattices by University of Pittsburgh associate professor of physics W. Vincent Liu, whose paper “Topological Matter in Optical...

  • The Learnin' Corner: Algorithmic Randomness

    _Marcus Hutter is a professor in the Research School of Computer Science at the Australian National University in Canberra. He’s most notable for his work in the field of artificial intelligence theory, which is like philosophy with way more math. Here...

  • The Learnin' Corner: How the Early Universe Got Something From Nothing

    _Michael J. Ramsey-Musolf is a professor of physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research concerns the interface of theoretical nuclear physics, particle physics, astrophysics, and cosmology._ We think that the universe started with a...

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  • Braid Theory

    Topology is the branch of mathematics concerned with the spatial properties of objects that cannot be changed by twisting, deforming, or stretching.