Opening new possibilities for quantum sensors, atomic clocks and tests of fundamental physics, JILA researchers have developed new ways of “entangling” or interlinking the properties of large numbers of particles. In the process they…
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To engineer materials with unique properties, like superconductivity, scientists dive into the quantum interactions between electrons and vibrational particles called phonons. When electrons and phonons strongly interact, they behave as…
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In a new paper in The Astrophysical Journal, JILA Fellow Jason Dexter, graduate student Kirk Long, and other collaborators compared two main theoretical…
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In a recent Science paper, researchers led by JILA and NIST Fellow Jun Ye, along with collaborators JILA and NIST Fellow David Nesbitt, scientists from the…
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In a new ACS Nano paper, JILA and NIST Fellow David Nesbitt, along with former graduate student Jacob Pettine and other collaborators, developed a new method…
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Metal ions can be found in almost every environment, including wastewater, chemical waste and electronic recycling waste. Properly recovering and recycling valuable metals from various sources is crucial for sustainable resource…
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Some of the biggest questions about our universe may be solved by scientists using its tiniest particles. Since the 1960s, physicists have been looking at particle interactions to understand an observed imbalance of matter and…
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Quantum materials, a fascinating class of materials that harness the power of quantum mechanics, are revolutionizing modern science and technology. Quantum materials often possess exotic states of matter, such as superconductivity or…
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Two-dimensional materials, like graphene and 2D semiconductors, are an area of physics that has been growing tremendously in the last decade. According to JILA graduate student Ben Whetten, “That’s because they exhibit new spin and…
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The best clock in the world has no hands, no pendulum, no face or digital display. It is made of ultra-cold atoms trapped by light.  This atomic clock is so precise that, had it begun ticking when Earth formed billions of years ago, it…
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Although one might think it would be simple, the genetics of bacteria can be rather complicated. A bacterium’s genes use a set of regulatory proteins and other molecules to monitor and change genetic expressions within the organism. One…
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For a new study, a team of physicists recruited roughly 1,000 undergraduate students at CU Boulder to help answer one of the most enduring questions about the sun: How does the star’s outermost atmosphere, or “corona,” get so hot?…
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Dipolar gases have become an increasingly important topic in the field of quantum physics in recent years. These gases consist of atoms or molecules that possess a non-zero electric dipole moment, which gives rise to long-range dipole-…
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For decades, black holes have fascinated scientists and nonscientists alike. Their ominous voids, like an open pair of jaws, has inspired a whole wave of science-fiction featuring the phenomenon. Physicists have also been similarly…
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JILA researchers have upgraded a breathalyzer based on Nobel Prize-winning frequency-comb technology and combined it with machine learning to detect SARS-CoV-2 infection in 170 volunteer subjects with excellent accuracy. Their…
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When a superconducting material is cooled down below a critical temperature, something seemingly magical happens: its electrical resistivity drops abruptly to zero! Initially, before 1911, this was thought to be impossible, given that…
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Quantum gases of interacting molecules can exhibit unique dynamics. JILA and NIST Physicist Jun Ye has spent years of research to reveal, probe, and control these dynamics with potassium-rubidium molecules. In a new article published in…
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Though microscopes have been in use for centuries, there is still much that we cannot see at the smallest length scales. Current microscopies range from the simple optical microscopes used in high school science classes, to x-ray…
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When it comes to creating ever more intriguing quantum systems, a constant need is finding new ways to observe them in a wide range of physical scenarios.  JILA Fellow Cindy Regal and JILA and NIST Fellow Ana Maria Rey have teamed up…
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There are many methods to determine what the limits are for certain processes. Many of these methods look to reach the upper and lower bounds to identify them for making accurate measurements and calculations. In the growing field of…
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At ultra-cold temperatures, quantum mechanics dictate how particles bump into each other. The collisions depend both on the quantum statistics of the colliding partners (their location within the medium) and on their collisional energy…
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Sitting 150 million kilometers away from the Earth, the Sun produces puzzling phenomena, like solar flares, that physicists are working to understand. One of these puzzles involves the Sun's tachocline, a belt of heat transition. “A…
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Atomic clocks are crucial for everyday living as they help our telecommunications, electrical power grids, GPS systems, transportation, and other processes around the world keep precise time. Some of these clocks use lasers and special…
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JILA and NIST Fellow James K. Thompson’s team of researchers have for the first time successfully combined two of the “spookiest” features of quantum mechanics to make a better quantum sensor:  entanglement between atoms and…
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Atomic clocks are essential in building a precise time standard for the world, which is a big focus for researchers at JILA. JILA and NIST Fellow Jun Ye, in particular, has studied atomic clocks for two decades, looking into ways to…
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Of all the atoms that quantum physicists study, alkaline atoms hold a special place due to their unique structure. Found in the second column of the periodic table, these atoms have two outer electrons, allowing the atoms to interact…
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Quantum science promises a range of technological breakthroughs, such as quantum computers that can help discover new pharmaceuticals or quantum sensors for navigation. These capabilities rest on two unusual properties of quantum…
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Lasers have not only fascinated scientists for decades, but they have also become an integral part of many electronic devices. To create scientific-grade lasers, physicists try to control the temporal, spatial, phase, and polarization…
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JILA Fellow Cindy Regal and her team, along with researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), have for the first time demonstrated that they can trap single atoms using a novel miniaturized version of “…
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More than 400 years later, scientists are in the midst of an equally-important revolution. They’re diving into a previously-hidden realm—far wilder than anything van Leeuwenhoek, known as the “father of microbiology,” could have…
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