Scicomm
Consider a bunch of molecules that have been trapped between two mirrors facing each other very closely. In this 'box' the light can't move around freely; it can only exist in certain fixed patterns, somewhat like sound inside a finely tuned musical instrument. Even when all
Analysis
Picture a city where most drivers use the same navigation app. At 9 am, the app says one side street is the quickest shortcut to get from area A to area B. Thousands of commuters accept this option and drive through that street, and soon it becomes jammed with traffic.
Analysis
The problem begins simply enough. A journalist finds a word that seems to fit almost everything. It might be "crisis", "pivot" or the ever-convenient "impact". It's concise, authoritative, and headline-friendly. It appears once, then again, and soon it begins to dominate the
Scicomm
Scientists have uncovered a remarkable self-healing property in a strange class of materials known as quasicrystals, revealing their ability to grow into a perfect, single structure even when faced with obstacles. The discovery challenges a long-held understanding of crystal formation and opens the door to creating large, strong materials free
Scicomm
When light, sound or any kind of wave travels through a complex medium like fog, murky water, or biological tissue, it scatters in many directions. Each particle or irregularity in the medium changes the path of the waves, scrambling them and blurring the resulting image. This is why doctors struggle
Analysis
Bayes's rule is one of the most fundamental principles in probability and statistics. It allows us to update our beliefs in the face of new evidence. In its simplest form, the rule tells us how to revise the probability of a hypothesis once new data becomes available. A
Analysis
The double-slit experiment has often been described as the most beautiful demonstration in physics. In one striking image, it shows the strange dual character of matter and light. When particles such as electrons or photons are sent through two narrow slits, the resulting pattern on a screen behind them is
Analysis
Maxwell’s demon is one of the most famous thought experiments in the history of physics, a puzzle first posed in the 1860s that continues to shape scientific debates to this day. I’ve struggled to make sense of it for years. Last week I had some time and decided
Scicomm
Carbon is famous for its many solid forms. It's the soot in air pollution, the graphite in pencil leads, and the glittering diamond in expensive jewellery. It's also the carbon nanotubes in biosensors and fullerenes in organic solar cells. However, despite its ability to exist in
Scicomm
At the heart of particle physics lies the Standard Model, a theory that has stood for nearly half a century as the best description of the subatomic realm. It tells us what particles exist, how they interact, and why the universe is stable at the smallest scales. The Standard Model
Culture
And to Paul Feyerabend
Analysis
In science, paradoxes often appear when familiar rules are pushed into unfamiliar territory. One of them is Parrondo’s paradox, a curious mathematical result showing that when two losing strategies are combined, they can produce a winning outcome. This might sound like trickery but the paradox has deep connections to