Science & Technology

Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis will develop and deploy a new telescope designed to measure the linear polarization of X-rays arriving from distant neutron stars, black holes and other exotic celestial objects. The instrument will be flown on a minimum of two scientific balloon launches as early as summer 2021. The NASA-funded effort builds on promising results from a previous balloon-borne mission known as X-Calibur and is dubbed XL-Calibur.

Under a five-year, $7 million cooperative agreement led by Jeffrey Gillis-Davis, research associate professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, researchers will investigate fundamental questions at the intersection of space science and human space exploration.

While evidence for dark matter is strong, the nature of dark matter has remained a mystery. James H. Buckley, professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, is part of a research team searching for axions — very light, invisible particles streaming through the cosmos.

New research from Washington University in St. Louis realizes one of the first parity time-symmetric quantum systems, allowing scientists to observe how that symmetry — and the breaking of it — leads to previously unexplored phenomena. These and future PT symmetry experiments have potential applications to quantum computing. The work from the laboratory of Kater Murch, associate professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, is published Oct. 7 in the journal Nature Physics.

Even in the strange world of open quantum systems, the arrow of time points steadily forward — most of the time. A video details new experiments conducted at Washington University in St. Louis that compare the forward and reverse trajectories of superconducting circuits called qubits, and find that they largely tend to follow the second law of thermodynamics. The research is published July 9 in the journal Physical Review Letters.

New research from Washington University in St. Louis provides compelling evidence that magmas may be wetter than once thought. The work led by experimental geochemists including Michael J. Krawczynski in Arts & Sciences is published in the July 2 issue of the journal American Mineralogist.

The university’s interdisciplinary Center for Quantum Sensors aims to harness the power of quantum mechanics to detect and decipher some of the universe’s greatest mysteries. The effort is timely as Congress recently approved a federal program supporting the development of quantum technologies.

Researchers in Arts & Sciences have discovered and characterized a new form of oxygen dubbed “featherweight oxygen” — the lightest-ever version of the familiar chemical element oxygen, with only three neutrons to its eight protons.

David Peters, the McDonnell Douglas Professor of Engineering in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, has a body of work in applied aerodynamics and a host of academic honors, but he’s also a baseball fan. That’s why watching a baseball game takes on a whole new spin, aerodynamically speaking.

Richard Alley, the Evan Pugh Professor of Geosciences at Pennsylvania State University, will deliver the McDonnell Distinguished Lecture on March 6 at Washington University in St. Louis. Alley’s lecture is titled “Finding the Good News on Energy and Environment.”