“There’s a lot of meanings for ‘small,’” says Janet Conrad, a particle physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ...

Rutgers scientist Phoebe Stapleton answers PEOPLE's questions about a pioneering new study on nano-sized plastic particles discovered in bottled water.

The particles are so tiny that the task of making them collide is like firing two needles 10 kilometres (6 miles) at each other with the precision to make them collide.

According to quantum mechanics, particles are simultaneously in two or more states until observed – an effect vividly captured by Schrödinger’s famous thought experiment of a cat that is both ...

Quantum superposition is the idea that particles exist in multiple states at once. When a measurement is performed, it is as if the particle selects one of the states in the superposition.

A cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator. It uses magnetic and electric fields to speed up charged particles like protons or ions to very high speeds. This allows the particles to collide with ...

By proving how individual molecules create the complex motion of fluids, three mathematicians have illuminated why time can’t flow in reverse.

An aurora is one of nature’s most spectacular sights, a dazzling glow in the upper atmosphere driven by space weather.