Scientists believe that if a nuclear clock is developed – one that uses the atomic nucleus to measure time with extreme precision – even the tiniest irregularities in its ticking could reveal dark matter’s influence. Last year, physicists in Germany and Colorado made a breakthrough toward building such a clock, using the radioactive element thorium-229. When researchers in Prof. Gilad Perez’s theoretical physics group at the Weizmann Institute of Science learned of this achievement, they recognized a new opportunity to advance the search for dark matter, even before a fully functional nuclear clock becomes a reality. In collaboration with the German team, they recently published a study in Physical Review X proposing a novel method for detecting dark matter’s influence on properties of the thorium-229 nucleus.

The LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA (LVK) Collaboration has detected the merger of the most massive black holes ever observed with gravitational waves using the US National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded LIGO observatories.

Students from The Ohio State University have developed a novel cryogenic refueling system for use in long-term space exploration beyond Earth’s orbit.