Even on a black hole’s turf, an essential constant of nature holds steady. According to standard physics, the fine-structure constant, which governs interactions of electrically charged particles, is ...

One of the most exciting prospects in physics has been discovering that fundamental constants are not actually constant at all. When I first started writing, physicists and astronomers were just ...

Detecting or constraining the possible time variations of fundamental physical constants is an important step toward a complete understanding of basic physics and hence the world in which we live. A ...

A fundamental constant of the universe may not be so constant after all, according to a new study. Recent observations of distant galaxies suggest that the strength of the electromagnetic force the so ...

In sports and in cosmology, the rules of the game aren't supposed to change as you go along. Athletes call this playing fair. Cosmologists call it the cosmological principle, and it means that the ...

Tampa, Fla. – A fundamental number that affects the color of light emitted by atoms as well as all chemical interactions has not changed in more than 7 billion years, according to observations by a ...

Thorium atomic nuclei can be used for very specific precision measurements. This had been suspected for decades, and the search for suitable atomic nucleus states had been ongoing worldwide. In 2024, ...

Sometimes we must look to the heavens to understand our own planet. In the 17th century, Johannes Kepler’s insight that planets move in elliptical orbits around the sun led to a deeper understanding ...