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The smallest magnetic data storage unit

January 24th 2012 19:35

Scientists from IBM and the German Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) has successfully stored one magnetic bit of data with 12 atoms of iron, i.e we need only 96 iron atoms to store a full byte ( 8 bits) of data. The new storage data density will be at least 100 times denser than flash memory chips.

12-atom bit

The new technology used antiferromagnetism, while conventional hard drives used ferromagnetism. Antiferromagnetic atom rows can be spaced much more closely without interfering with each other in magnetic field. This technolgy requires that the nano magnets must be kept at a temperature of -268 Celsius degree .

Video: IBM stores binary data on just 12 atoms, one step closer to atomic data storage
How did the IBM researchers read and write these 12-atom bits? The answer is a scanning tunneling microscope (STM). Antiferromagnetism used to store a binary bit first. Then the STM is used to measure the magnetism of a given atom to see if the magnetic bit has a binary value of 0 or 1.

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Posted By: Jiansen Lu - Category: No Category

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First extrosolar planet within habitable zone

January 15th 2012 07:41

The habitable zone is the region considered favorable to life, where liquid water can be maintained on the planet surface. The research team from NASA Ames Research Center announced that the planet Kepler-22b is the first confirmed extrasolar planet in habitable zone on December 5, 2011.

The planet Kepler-22b is 600 light-years away from us with a surface temperature of about 22 Celsius, while the surface composition remains unknown. It's radius is roughly 2.4 times the radius of Earth. The discovery supports that the our galaxy or our universe are full of life and Earth like planets.

Imagination of Kepler-22b

Video: The Promise of Kepler-22b
Exciting news from the Kepler mission! Here's what happened: they discovered a planet that is roughly the size of Earth, and is a good distance from the planet.

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Time hole is possible

January 11th 2012 00:24

In Einstein General relativity, clocks which are far from massive bodies run faster, and clocks close to massive bodies run slower. Einstein predicted the existence of wormholes in the universe. But the ability to travel through wormholes to get across space faster is only a hypothetical till now. The research at Cornell university shows that the time is possible to slow down and stop. It is possible to create a time hole. Although it only hides an event for 40 picoseconds.

Time hole

Cornell University physicists are able to manipulate light in a certain time, speed up or slow down, to create a gap for time hole.

Video: Black Holes and Worm Holes
A short video about black holes and worm holes taken from a show called the universe.

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A new particle is discovered by LHC

December 28th 2011 19:22

ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider discovered a new particle called Chi_b(3P). Chi_b(3P) is a bottom-antibottom quark bound state with orbital angular momentum L=1, total spin S=1 and radial quantum number n=3, while those with radial quantum number n=1 and n=2 are already discovered. Chi_b(3P) is predicted by theorists many years ago, but was not observed before. The discovery of Chi_b(3P) is a great way to test theoretical calculation.

Standard Model of Matter

We can not see a single quark. We can only study quarks via their bound states and combination. Through studying Chi_b(3P), we will have a better understanding of strong force, which binds quarks together. Will Higgs boson be discovered after the discovery of Chi_b(3P)? Let us wait and let time tell us.

Video: CERN: The Standard Model Of Particle Physics

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How will our human civilization end

December 4th 2011 07:23

We may feel that our human is somehow special and immune to extinction. From out of Africa, we only exist 200,000 years. We may not have better luck than dinosaurs, who existed 165 million years. There are many natural and man made disasters that could wipe us out.

The one biggest risk in short term may be from ourselves. We can not control human overpopulation, which may cause war, even nuclear war. Scientific accidents may kill us too, like a child playing bombs. The air pollution, disease and virus spread and global weather change may end our civilization too.

For the long term, earthquake, volcano, giant meteor smashing into the earth, and alien invasion may cause our civilization end.

End of human civilization

Final termination of our human being is that our Sun dies, which will happen in 5 billion years. As the Sun grows old, it will expand, cool down and run out of hydrogen and then helium. Finally it will become a red giant star.

Even we are lucky and escape to another planet, Galaxies will collide in 7 billion years and the Milky Way ends. If we can run out of the Milky way, the Universe will end in 3 trillion years from now. There will be no normal matter and no time.

Video: History Channel - The Universe - The End of the Universe