In a world first, researchers from the University of Ottawa in collaboration with Israeli scientists have been able to create optical framed knots in the laboratory that could potentially be applied in modern technologies. Their work opens the door to new methods of distributing secret cryptographic keys — used to encrypt and decrypt data, ensure secure communication and protect private information. The group recently published their findings in Nature Communications.

“This is fundamentally important, in particular from a topology-focused perspective, since framed knots provide a platform for topological quantum computations,” explained senior author, Professor Ebrahim Karimi, Canada Research Chair in Structured Light at the University of Ottawa.

“In addition, we used these non-...

After almost two years circling an ancient asteroid hundreds of millions of miles away, a NASA spacecraft this week will attempt to descend to the treacherous, boulder-packed surface and snatch a handful of rubble.

The drama unfolds Tuesday as the U.S. takes its first crack at collecting asteroid samples for return to Earth, a feat accomplished so far only by Japan.

Brimming with names inspired by Egyptian mythology, the Osiris-Rex mission ...

A world-first study by Monash University engineers has demonstrated improvements in the fatigue life of high strength aluminium alloys by 25 times — a significant outcome for the transport manufacturing industry.

Published today (Thursday 15 October 2020) in the journal Nature Communications, researchers demonstrated that the poor fatigue performance of high strength aluminium alloys was because of weak links called ‘precipitate free zones’ (PFZs).

The team led by Professor Christopher Hutchinson, a Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Monash University in Australia, was able to make aluminium alloy microstructures that can heal the weak links while in operation (i.e...

In a surprising discovery, astronomers using two Maunakea Observatories — W. M. Keck Observatory and Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) — have found a globular star cluster in the Andromeda Galaxy that contains a record-breaking low amount of metals.

The stars in the cluster, called RBC EXT8, have on average 800 times less iron than our Sun and are three times more iron-poor than the previous globular cluster record-holder. RBC EXT8 is also extremely deficient in magnesium.

The study, led by Søren Larsen of Radboud University in the Netherlands, is published in today’s issue of the journal Science...