Top Physical & Tech News

February 17, 2026

Top Headlines

Scientists Confirm One-dimensional Electron Behavior in Phosphorus Chains

Feb. 16, 2026 For the first time, researchers have shown that self-assembled phosphorus chains can host genuinely one-dimensional electron behavior. Using advanced imaging and spectroscopy techniques, they separated the signals from chains aligned in different ...

AI Reads Brain MRIs in Seconds and Flags Emergencies

Feb. 10, 2026 Researchers at the University of Michigan have created an AI system that can interpret brain MRI scans in just seconds, accurately identifying a wide range of neurological conditions and determining which cases need urgent care. Trained on hundreds ...

New Catalyst Turns Carbon Dioxide Into Clean Fuel Source

Feb. 3, 2026 Researchers have found that manganese, an abundant and inexpensive metal, can be used to efficiently convert carbon dioxide into formate, a potential hydrogen source for fuel cells. The key was a clever redesign that made the catalyst last far ...

NASA’s Perseverance Rover Completes the First AI-planned Drive on Mars

Feb. 2, 2026 NASA’s Perseverance rover has just made history by driving across Mars using routes planned by artificial intelligence instead of human operators. A vision-capable AI analyzed the same images and terrain data normally used by rover planners, ...

Robots Descend Into Lava Tubes to Prepare for Future Moon Bases

Feb. 2, 2026 Hidden lava tunnels on the Moon and Mars could one day shelter human explorers, offering natural protection from radiation and space debris. A European research team has unveiled a bold new mission concept that uses three different robots working ...

“Existential Risk” – Why Scientists Are Racing to Define Consciousness

Feb. 1, 2026 Scientists warn that rapid advances in AI and neurotechnology are outpacing our understanding of consciousness, creating serious ethical risks. New research argues that developing scientific tests ...

This AI App Can Tell Which Dinosaur Made a Footprint

Feb. 1, 2026 Dinosaur footprints have always been mysterious, but a new AI app is cracking their secrets. DinoTracker analyzes photos of fossil tracks and predicts which dinosaur made them, with accuracy rivaling human experts. Along the way, it uncovered ...

Scientists Discover Hidden Geometry That Bends Electrons Like Gravity

Feb. 1, 2026 Researchers have discovered a hidden quantum geometry inside materials that subtly steers electrons, echoing how gravity warps light in space. Once thought to exist only on paper, this effect has now been observed experimentally in a popular quantum ...

Weak Magnetism Causes Big Changes in a Strange State of Matter

Jan. 31, 2026 A strange, glowing form of matter called dusty plasma turns out to be incredibly sensitive to magnetic fields. Researchers found that even weak fields can change how tiny particles grow, simply by nudging electrons into new motions. In lab ...

A Hidden Magnetic Order Could Unlock Superconductivity

Jan. 26, 2026 Physicists have discovered that hidden magnetic order plays a key role in the pseudogap, a puzzling state of matter that appears just before certain materials become superconductors. Using an ultra-cold quantum simulator, the team found that even ...

Distant Entangled Atoms Acting as One Sensor Deliver Stunning Precision

Jan. 26, 2026 Researchers have demonstrated that quantum entanglement can link atoms across space to improve measurement accuracy. By splitting an entangled group of atoms into separate clouds, they were able to measure electromagnetic fields more precisely than ...

Scientists Twist Tiny Crystals to Control Electricity

Jan. 25, 2026 Researchers have developed a technique that allows them to carve complex three dimensional nanodevices directly from single crystals. To demonstrate its power, they sculpted microscopic helices from a magnetic material and found that the structures ...

Latest Headlines

updated 7:08am EST

The Surprisingly Simple Flaw That Can Undermine Quantum Encryption

Feb. 17, 2026 Quantum key distribution promises ultra-secure communication by using the strange rules of quantum physics to detect eavesdroppers instantly. But even the most secure quantum link can falter if the ...

Majorana Qubits Decoded in Quantum Computing Breakthrough

Feb. 16, 2026 Scientists have developed a new way to read the hidden states of Majorana qubits, which store information in paired quantum modes that resist noise. The results confirm their protected nature and ...

Brain Inspired Machines Are Better at Math Than Expected

Feb. 14, 2026 Neuromorphic computers modeled after the human brain can now solve the complex equations behind physics simulations — something once thought possible only with energy-hungry supercomputers. The ...

Twisted 2D Magnet Creates Skyrmions for Ultra Dense Data Storage

Feb. 13, 2026 As data keeps exploding worldwide, scientists are racing to pack more information into smaller and smaller spaces — and a team at the University of Stuttgart may have just unlocked a powerful new ...

New Calcium-Ion Battery Design Delivers High Performance Without Lithium

Feb. 13, 2026 Scientists at HKUST have unveiled a major leap forward in calcium-ion battery technology, potentially opening the door to safer, more sustainable energy storage for everything from renewable power ...

Scientists Create Smart Synthetic Skin That Can Hide Images and Change Shape

Feb. 6, 2026 Inspired by the shape-shifting skin of octopuses, Penn State researchers developed a smart hydrogel that can change appearance, texture, and shape on ...

A Clever Quantum Trick Brings Practical Quantum Computers Closer

Feb. 6, 2026 Quantum computers struggle because their qubits are incredibly easy to disrupt, especially during calculations. A new experiment shows how to perform quantum operations while continuously fixing ...

This Paper-Thin Chip Turns Invisible Light Into a Steerable Beam

Feb. 5, 2026 Researchers have built a paper-thin chip that converts infrared light into visible light and directs it precisely, all without mechanical motion. The design overcomes a long-standing ...

Doctors May Be Missing Early Signs of Kidney Disease

Feb. 5, 2026 Kidney disease often creeps in silently, and many patients aren’t diagnosed until major damage is already done. New research shows that even “normal” kidney test results can signal danger if ...

This Ultra-Thin Surface Controls Light in Two Completely Different Ways

Feb. 5, 2026 A new metasurface design lets light of different spins bend, focus, and behave independently—while staying sharp across many colors. The trick combines two geometric phase effects so each spin ...

Earlier Headlines

Rocky Planet Discovered in Outer Orbit Challenges Planet Formation Theory

Feb. 13, 2026 Astronomers have uncovered a distant planetary system that flips a long-standing rule of planet formation on its head. Around the small red dwarf star LHS 1903, scientists expected to find rocky ...

Astronomers Watch a Massive Star Collapse Into a Black Hole Without a Supernova

Feb. 14, 2026 A massive star 2.5 million light-years away simply vanished — and astronomers now know why. Instead of exploding in a supernova, it quietly collapsed into a black hole, shedding its outer layers in ...

Twin Beams Blast from a Hidden Star in Stunning Hubble Space Telescope Image

Feb. 13, 2026 A dazzling new Hubble image peels back the layers of the mysterious Egg Nebula, a rare and fleeting phase in a Sun-like star’s death just 1,000 light-years away. Hidden inside a dense cocoon of ...

Ultra-Fast Pulsar Found Near the Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole

Feb. 17, 2026 Scientists scanning the heart of the Milky Way have spotted a tantalizing signal: a possible ultra-fast pulsar spinning every 8.19 milliseconds near Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at our ...

Asteroid Bennu Reveals a New Pathway to Life’s Chemistry

Feb. 12, 2026 Dust from asteroid Bennu is revealing a surprising origin story for life’s building blocks. New research suggests some amino acids formed in frozen ice exposed to radiation, not warm liquid water ...

Radar Evidence Suggests a Massive Lava Tube Beneath Venus

Feb. 12, 2026 Scientists have uncovered evidence of a massive underground lava tube hidden beneath the surface of Venus, revealing a new layer of the planet’s volcanic history. By reexamining radar data from ...

Astronomers Shocked by How These Giant Exoplanets Formed

Feb. 11, 2026 A distant star system with four super-sized gas giants has revealed a surprise. Thanks to JWST’s powerful vision, astronomers detected sulfur in their atmospheres — a chemical clue that they ...

NASA Scientists Say Meteorites Can’t Explain Mysterious Organic Compounds on Mars

Feb. 12, 2026 Scientists studying a rock sample collected by NASA’s Curiosity rover have uncovered something tantalizing: the largest organic molecules ever detected on Mars. The compounds — decane, undecane, ...

James Webb Reveals Extraordinary Organic Molecules in an Ultra Luminous Infrared Galaxy

Feb. 12, 2026 Deep inside a nearby galaxy cloaked in thick clouds of gas and dust, astronomers have uncovered a surprising treasure trove of organic molecules using the James Webb Space Telescope. Peering through ...

Physicists Discover What Controls the Speed of Quantum Time

Feb. 9, 2026 Time may feel smooth and continuous, but at the quantum level it behaves very differently. Physicists have now found a way to measure how long ultrafast quantum events actually last, without relying ...

This Tiny Molecular Trick Makes Spider Silk Almost Unbreakable

Feb. 6, 2026 Scientists have cracked a key mystery behind spider silk’s legendary strength and flexibility. They discovered that tiny molecular interactions act like natural glue, holding silk proteins together ...

Dark Matter Could Be Masquerading as a Black Hole at the Milky Way’s Core

Feb. 7, 2026 Astronomers propose that an ultra-dense clump of exotic dark matter could be masquerading as the powerful object thought to anchor our galaxy, explaining both the blistering speeds of stars near the ...

Scientists Are Hunting for a Forbidden Antimatter Transformation

Feb. 2, 2026 MACE is a next-generation experiment designed to catch muonium transforming into its antimatter twin, a process that would rewrite the rules of particle physics. The last search for this effect ended ...

A New Way to Control Light Could Boost Future Wireless Tech

Feb. 4, 2026 A new optical device allows researchers to generate and switch between two stable, donut-shaped light patterns called skyrmions. These light vortices hold their shape even when disturbed, making them ...

A Record Breaking Gravitational Wave Is Helping Test Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity

Feb. 1, 2026 A newly detected gravitational wave, GW250114, is giving scientists their clearest look yet at a black hole collision—and a powerful way to test Einstein’s theory of gravity. Its clarity allowed ...

Scientists Found a Way to Cool Quantum Computers Using Noise

Jan. 29, 2026 Quantum computers need extreme cold to work, but the very systems that keep them cold also create noise that can destroy fragile quantum information. Scientists in Sweden have now flipped that ...

A Superfluid Freezes and Breaks the Rules of Physics

Feb. 5, 2026 Physicists have watched a quantum fluid do something once thought almost impossible: stop moving. In experiments with ultra-thin graphene, researchers observed a superfluid—normally defined by its ...

Four Astronauts Enter Quarantine as NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 Launch Nears

Feb. 2, 2026 NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 team has entered a carefully controlled two-week quarantine as the countdown begins for their journey to the International Space Station. The four astronauts—representing ...

A Tiny Light Trap Could Unlock Million Qubit Quantum Computers

Feb. 2, 2026 A new light-based breakthrough could help quantum computers finally scale up. Stanford researchers created miniature optical cavities that efficiently collect light from individual atoms, allowing ...

Astronomers Discover an Earth-Like Planet That May Be Colder Than Mars

Feb. 12, 2026 A newly identified planet candidate, HD 137010 b, looks strikingly Earth-like in size and orbit — but it may be colder than Mars due to its dimmer star. If it has a thick enough atmosphere, though, ...