Category: 7. Science

Our two-person team loaded the car with a GPS, a drone, notebooks, sample bags, a trowel and a flat spatula lovingly called a scoopula. Then we drove 30 minutes in our rented truck from Yuma, Arizona, to the Algodones Dunes, a sandy field bordering California, Arizona and Mexico. The day was sunny, with a strong breeze. Turning off the highway, we carefully headed onto a gravelly path that acted as our road.

After making decent – if bumpy – progress, we pulled off onto the sand flats and drove slowly toward the dunes, worried we might get stuck in the sand. Having arrived on the outskirts of the Algodones, we stopped and loaded our backpacks, then set off into the desert on foot.

It was November 2022. As a graduate student at Texas A&M University, I was beginning part of my Ph.D. research with my adviser, geology professor Ryan Ewing. We were looking for coarse-grained sand ripples, which are patterned piles of sand shaped by wind. Sand ripples and sand dunes are types of aeolian bedforms, which are wind-created geologic features.

Aeolian bedforms are common on Earth and across the solar system, including on Mars, Venus, Pluto, the Saturn moon Titan, the Neptune moon Triton, and Comet 67P. These geological features, among the first landforms observed by remote images of planetary surfaces, are robust indicators of a world’s wind patterns.

Measuring sand patterns in person

The shapes and patterns of aeolian bedforms can reveal the environmental conditions that created them.

Two sizes of the same bedform, such as small dunes on top of big dunes, are called compound bedforms. I study compound bedforms at two scales – the meter- and centimeter-sized coarse-grained ripples at the dunes here on Earth, and the kilometer- and meter-sized dunes on Mars.

At the Algodones, I measured the height of each large coarse-grained sand ripple and the distance between neighboring ripples. Then we flew our drone low and steady, above the ripples, to create high-resolution images. The drone data allows us to do further measurements on the ripples later, back at my desk.

On that day, I learned an essential rule of fieldwork in the desert: Don’t forget a shovel. Otherwise, if your vehicle gets stuck, as ours did, you’ll have to dig it out by hand. Luckily for us, a dune buggy driver passing by helped us out and we were able to get back to Yuma in time for dinner.

My introduction to Mars

I first became interested in aeolian bedforms during my sophomore year of college, when I interned at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. My job was to view surface images of Mars and then map the sand ripples in the regions where Perseverance, the Mars rover, might land. I assessed the areas where ripples could be hazards – places where the rover could get stuck in the sand, the way our rental truck did in the Algodones.

I mapped those sand ripples on Mars for two years. But while I mapped, I became fascinated with the patterns the ripples made.

Now, as a graduate student and aspiring planetary geologist, my time is split between work in the field and at my computer, where I have stitched together the drone’s photographs of the Algodones to create a large image of the entire study area. I then look for compound dunes on the Martian surface in images taken by the Mars reconnaissance orbiter’s context camera.

Scientists already know about Earth’s weather patterns, sand grain size and wind data. By measuring different parts of bedforms on both planets – such as their height, shape and spacing – I can compare the similarities and differences of the bedforms to find clues to the wind patterns, grains and atmosphere on Mars. Slowly but surely, as I listen to Studio Ghibli soundtracks, I’m creating the first database of compound dunes on Mars.

Developing this database is essential to the proposed human mission to Mars. Dust storms are frequent, and some can encircle the entire planet. Understanding aeolian bedforms will help scientists know where to put bases so they don’t get buried by moving sand.

It is wonderful to spend an afternoon ping-ponging all over a planet that’s 140 million miles from us, seeing gorgeous terrain while I try to answer questions about the compound dunes on Mars. How common are they? Where do they form? How do they compare to those on Earth? I hope to answer these questions as I work toward earning my Ph.D in geology.

FAYETTEVILLE, GA, UNITED STATES, July 10, 2025 /EINPresswire.com/ — Intrinsic dispersion in periodic systems sets a fundamental bound for independent selectivity of resonant angles and wavelengths. This hinders applications requiring concurrent selectivity of angles and wavelengths, such as AR/VR, coherent thermal emission and light detection. Scientists in China proposed a method to on-demand tailor the angle-dependent resonant reflection via radiation directionality in misaligned bilayer metagratings. This strategy enables perfect reflection at a single angle and a single wavelength, overcoming the intrinsic dispersion locking.

Wavelength and propagation direction (angle) are two fundamental properties of light. The ability to selectively control both a specific wavelength and a specific angle forms the physical foundation for many advanced optical applications. However, due to the intrinsic dispersion in periodic systems, there exists an intrinsic locking relationship between angle and wavelength in the resonant spectrum. As a result, it has been widely accepted that changing the angle of incidence inevitably shifts the filtering wavelength of optical devices. This relationship between angle and wavelength in resonant spectra makes their independent control challenging and imposes fundamental limitations on optical applications. Examples include rainbow artifacts in AR waveguides caused by dispersion, image quality degradation due to lateral chromatic dispersion in wide-field imaging, angular crosstalk in photodetectors reducing spectral reconstruction accuracy, and limitations in designing high-efficiency directional light sources.

In a new paper published in eLight, a team of scientists, jointly led by Professor Jian-Wen Dong from Sun Yat-sen University, and Lei Zhou from Fudan University, have discovered that the radiation directionality of optical modes is key to overcoming this fundamental challenge.Through theoretical analysis, they established a complete phase diagram for engineering resonant spectra via radiation directionality, revealing that spatial inversion symmetry and highly directional radiation of optical modes are the essential physical conditions for breaking angle-wavelength locking.

Based on this, they introduced a degree of lateral displacement in bilayer metagratings. This design preserves spatial inversion symmetry while breaking vertical mirror symmetry, enabling precise angular control of radiation directionality. Theoretically, they predicted that resonant reflection occurs only at normal incidence and near the central wavelength. They also proposed general designs for achieving spatio-spectral selectivity at arbitrary angles and wavelengths.

“Radiation directionality acts like a ‘magical eraser’, allowing us to precisely suppress light’s spectral signature along a dispersion curve. This capability allows for independent selectivity of angle and wavelength, overcoming the limitation imposed by intrinsic dispersion” they summarized.

“Experimental fabrication of the bilayer metagratings is another challenge, since achieving both the flatness of ultra-thin spacer layers and the precise lateral misalignment between layers requires sophisticated nanofabrication techniques” they added.

To address this, they have developed a novel fabrication approach involving multiple etching steps, indirect thickness measurements, and iterative deposition processes. This was combined with a high-precision bilayer alignment technique to successfully fabricate high-quality, near-infrared working bilayer metagratings. This method offers excellent spacer flatness and thickness tunability, ~10 nm alignment accuracy, and compatibility with various spacer materials, establishing a flexible experimental platform for studying bilayer photonic systems.

Using this platform, they experimentally demonstrated high reflectance happening only at a single angle and a single wavelength. To confirm that the novel reflectance roots in the radiation directionality, they also performed angle-resolved optical microscopy measurements to characterize the radiation directionality of the sample. By combining temporal coupled-mode theory with cross-polarization measurement techniques, they quantitatively measured the unidirectional radiation of the resonant modes.

Furthermore, the research team have pioneered the development of millimeter-scale, high-precision bilayer metagratings and successfully achieved high-contrast imaging with concurrent spatial- and spectral-frequency selectivity at 0° and 1342 nm. This opens new opportunities for compact optical imaging and optical computing technologies.

“This research not only offers an innovative solution to address the fundamental challenge of independently controlling angle and wavelength, but also provides new insights for technological applications such as AR/VR displays, spectral imaging, coherent thermal radiation, and advanced semiconductor manufacturing” the scientists forecast.

References
DOI
10.1186/s43593-025-00092-y

Original Source URL
https://doi.org/10.1186/s43593-025-00092-y

Funding Information
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China grant 62035016;National Natural Science Foundation of China grant 12221004;National Natural Science Foundation of China grant 62192771;National Key Research Development Program of China grant 2021YFB2802300;National Key Research Development Program of China grant 2022YFA1404304;National Key Research Development Program of China grant 2022YFA1404700;National Key Research Development Program of China grant 2023YFB2806800;Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation grant 2023B1515040023;Natural Science Foundation of Shanghai grant 23dz2260100

Lucy Wang
BioDesign Research
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Over the past two centuries, humans have locked up enough water in dams to shift Earth’s poles slightly away from the planet’s axis of rotation, according to new research.

Earth’s outermost solid layer sits atop goopy molten rock, so it can move relative to the magma below it. Anytime mass is redistributed around the planet’s surface, like when ice sheets grow or shrink, this outermost rock layer wobbles and moves around. Imagine slapping a lump of clay onto one side of a spinning basketball: to maintain momentum, the part of the ball with the clay on it will shift slightly toward its equator and away from its axis of rotation. When this happens on Earth and the outermost rock layer wobbles around, different areas of the surface end up sitting directly over the axis of rotation. The geographic poles then pass through different spots on the surface than before, a process called true polar wander.

A new study in Geophysical Research Letters finds the construction of nearly 7,000 dams from 1835 to 2011 shifted the poles about a meter (3 feet) in total and caused a 21-millimeter (0.83-inch) drop in global sea levels. Together, these dams hold enough water to fill the Grand Canyon twice.

The results demonstrate another way human activities have affected the planet, according to the study authors. The polar shift is small, but it could help scientists understand how the poles will move if major glaciers and ice sheets melt due to climate change.

“As we trap water behind dams, not only does it remove water from the oceans, thus leading to a global sea level fall, it also distributes mass in a different way around the world,” said Natasha Valencic, a graduate student in Earth and planetary sciences at Harvard University and lead author of the new study. “We’re not going to drop into a new ice age, because the pole moved by about a meter in total, but it does have implications for sea level.”

In the new study, Valencic and her colleagues used a global database of dams to map the locations of each dam and the amount of water each impounds. They analyzed how the water impoundment from 6,862 dams shifted Earth’s poles from 1835 to 2011.

Their results showed global dam building caused Earth’s poles to shift in two distinct phases. From 1835 to 1954, many dams were built in North America and Europe, shifting these areas toward the equator. The North Pole moved 20.5 centimeters (8 inches) toward the 103rd meridian east, which passes through Russia, Mongolia, China, and the Indochina Peninsula.

Then, from 1954 to 2011, dams were built in East Africa and Asia, and the pole shifted 57 centimeters (22 inches) toward the 117th meridian west, which passes through western North America and the South Pacific.

Over the entire period from 1835 to 2011, the poles moved about 113 centimeters (3.7 feet), with about 104 centimeters (3.4 feet) of movement happening in the 20th century.

The results show that researchers need to take water impoundment into consideration when calculating future sea level rise. In the 20th century, global sea levels rose by 1.2 millimeters per year on average, but humans trapped a quarter of that amount behind dams – a significant fraction, according to Valencic. And sea level rise does not happen uniformly around the globe.

“Depending on where you place dams and reservoirs, the geometry of sea level rise will change,” she said. “That’s another thing we need to consider, because these changes can be pretty large, pretty significant.”

Astronomers have made significant strides in understanding how planets like the ones in our solar system form by detecting planet-forming “pebbles” around two young stars

These tiny rocky particles were discovered orbiting DG Tau and HL Tau, two stars located approximately 450 light-years from Earth, providing a rare opportunity to understand the earliest stages of planetary formation.

Planetary seeds in action

The new observations show large reservoirs of solid material, or pebbles, in the wide discs of dust and gas that surround these young stars. These discs, known as protoplanetary discs, are the birthplaces of planets.

Over time, these tiny pebbles clump together, forming larger and larger bodies that eventually create planets like Earth, Jupiter, and other worlds in our solar system.

The importance of this discovery lies in the fact that these pebbles have been found at distances similar to Neptune’s orbit, which suggests that the entire planetary system could be forming right now in these distant stellar nurseries.

Understanding the missing link in planet formation

Although astronomers have always known that dusty discs often surround young stars and have discovered thousands of fully formed planets in other star systems, the in-between stage has always been much harder to observe.

Astronomers struggle with determining the size of the particles; smaller grains are easily visible using optical and infrared telescopes, but as the grains grow and clump into larger pebbles, their surface area decreases, making them harder to detect.

To solve this mystery, astronomers used MERLIN, which is a unique array of seven radio telescopes spread across the UK. This robust network is capable of detecting the radio signals emitted by centimetre-sized pebbles, which shine brightest at similar wavelengths.

A breakthrough using e-MERLIN

Using e-MERLIN, researchers captured a striking image of DG Tau’s disc showing centimetre-sized pebbles already present at long distances from the central star. A similar pattern of rocky seeds has also been observed around HL Tau. These findings suggest that planet formation begins much earlier and farther out than previously understood.

The project behind this breakthrough is known as PEBBLeS (Planet Earth Building-Blocks – a Legacy eMERLIN Survey), a large-scale effort to map and study the building blocks of future planetary systems.

The success of e-MERLIN will soon enable more powerful observations. The upcoming Square Kilometre Array (SKA) telescopes, currently under development in South Africa and Australia, will increase astronomers’ ability to study protoplanetary discs. With greater sensitivity and resolution, the SKA will be able to observe hundreds of developing planetary systems across our galaxy.

When science operations with the SKA-Mid telescope begin in 2031, researchers will be ready to build on the work started with e-MERLIN.

An astronaut on the International Space Station has captured a rare kind of lightning called a sprite while traveling 250 miles above the Texas–Mexico border. Referred to as “space lightning” and compared to a jellyfish in shape, the rare weather phenomenon was captured on camera by NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers.

The rare image was taken on July 3 by pilot Nichole Ayers, who launched to the ISS on March 14, 2025, as part of the SpaceX Crew-10 mission. It shows an ethereal crimson jellyfish-like flash shooting from the tops of clouds and into space. It’s known as a “red sprite,” but also as a transient luminous event, lightning in Earth’s upper atmosphere. According to NASA, these colorful, bright, faster-than-lightning flashes are generated above the clouds by thunderstorms.

Ayers’ Explanation Of The ‘Sprite’

“Just. Wow. As we went over Mexico and the U.S. this morning, I caught this sprite,” wrote Ayers on X/Twitter. “Sprites are TLEs or Transient Luminous Events that happen above the clouds and are triggered by intense electrical activity in the thunderstorms below. We have a great view above the clouds, so scientists can use these types of pictures to better understand the formation, characteristics, and relationship of TLEs to thunderstorms.” In a later message, she stated that it was a gigantic jet, another type of TLE. “So cool to learn as we go up here,” she wrote.

The image also shows the glow of Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and Houston to the northeast, with Torreón, Mexico, to the southwest. “Our hearts go out to the families affected by the flooding in the Texas Hill Country this weekend,” added Ayers.

How The Image Was Taken

The ISS is the best observation point humankind has for monitoring Earth at night but photographing lightning takes a huge amount of patience and trial and error. Astronauts on the ISS take photos from the Cupola (Italian for dome), an observatory module that has seven windows and allows photography of Earth. Ayers took the shot using a Nikon Z9 and a 50mm lens as part of a time-lapse project during which she took multiple images. “To record a photo like this takes skill to set up the camera but more than that, the knowledge of what lightning systems are likely to create sprites and the willingness to take 2000-5000 images where only one will record a sprite,” wrote NASA astronaut and astrophotographer Don Pettit on X/Twitter, who arrived back from the ISS on April 19. “Kudos to Nicole for her imagery efforts!”

The ISS And The ‘Great North American Eclipse’

Perhaps the most widely seen images taken from the ISS were those of the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024. NASA flight engineers Matthew Dominick and Jeanette Epps captured unique views of the moon’s shadow over part of Maine, U.S. and Quebec and New Brunswick, Canada. For the shots, NASA carefully adjusted the altitude of the orbiting laboratory for months, leading up to the final total solar eclipse in the contiguous U.S. until 2044.

Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.

On July 9, 2025, Earth spun a little faster than usual, enough to make the day about 1.3 to 1.6 milliseconds shorter than the standard 24 hours.

That may not sound like much, but it was the shortest day since modern records began.

Editors’ Highlights are summaries of recent papers by AGU’s journal editors.

Source: Perspectives of Earth and Space Scientists

Our modern society is increasingly reliant on multiple technologies that are vulnerable to the adverse effects of space weather. This necessitates effective public communication and awareness of various space weather phenomena as well as increased public engagement and preparedness for risk mitigation.

Chabanski et al. [2025] advocate for the development and implementation of a standardized naming convention of geomagnetic storms, along the lines of existing naming conventions in meteorology, astronomy, and geography.

The authors surveyed the top 50 geomagnetic storms over the past 47 years (since 1978), of which only five had names assigned by the scientific community. Drawing on lessons learned in other scientific disciplines, they propose the possible formation of an international working team comprised of International Space Weather Coordination Forum participants. This international team would implement a theoretical framework and a unified international standard for defining the criteria, protocols, and procedures for naming and cataloguing geomagnetic storms based on their minimum Disturbance Storm Time (Dst) indices and their solar origins.

This proposed initiative is about not only assigning names to geomagnetic storms but also empowering the public with the knowledge necessary to navigate the challenges of the 21st-century space environment.

Citation: Chabanski, S., de Montety, F., Lilensten, J., Poedts, S., & Spogli, L. (2025). The power of a name: Toward a unified approach to naming space weather events. Perspectives of Earth and Space Scientists, 6, e2025CN000285. https://doi.org/10.1029/2025CN000285

—Andrew Yau, Editor, Perspectives of Earth and Space Scientists

Text © 2025. The authors. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0
Except where otherwise noted, images are subject to copyright. Any reuse without express permission from the copyright owner is prohibited.

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Astronauts on future missions won’t be surviving on freeze-dried meals and protein bars. Instead, they might be harvesting fresh rice from compact plants just 10 centimetres tall, engineered specifically for life beyond Earth. The revolutionary ‘Moon Rice’ project is developing the perfect crop for sustained space habitation, combining cutting edge genetics with the practical needs of deep space exploration.

The challenge is enormous. Current space exploration relies heavily on pre-prepared, expensive meals shipped from Earth that are nutritionally limited and psychologically unsatisfying. As we prepare for permanent bases on the Moon and Mars, astronauts will need fresh food rich in vitamins, antioxidants, and fibre to counteract the negative health effects of the space environment.

“Living in space is all about recycling resources and living sustainably, we are trying to solve the same problems that we face here on Earth.” – Marta Del Bianco, a plant biologist at the Italian Space Agency leading the project.

The four-year collaborative effort involves three Italian universities, each contributing specialised expertise to create an entirely new type of crop. Their biggest obstacle though is size. Even dwarf varieties of rice grown on Earth are too large for space habitats where every cubic centimetre matters. Traditional dwarf crops achieve their compact size by manipulating gibberellin, a plant hormone that reduces height but creates problems with seed germination and productivity.

The University of Milan is tackling this challenge by isolating mutant rice varieties that grow to just 10 centimetres high, roughly the height of a typical smartphone. Meanwhile, researchers at the University of Rome are identifying genes that alter plant architecture to maximise production efficiency in minimal space. The University of Naples contributes expertise in space crop production, building on decades of research into growing plants in controlled environments.

Astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor harvests red Russian kale and dragoon lettuce on board the International Space Station where food growing experiments have been a key activity for astronauts during their stay. (Credit : NASA/ESA/Alexander Gerst)

Since meat production will be impractical in resource limited space habitats, the team is also engineering the rice to be more nutritionally complete. They’re increasing the protein content by boosting the ratio of protein rich embryo to starch, potentially making this tiny rice a more complete food source for astronauts.

The team are focussing their attention to try and resolve one of space’s most unique challenges: plant growth in microgravity. On Earth, plants use gravity to orient themselves, knowing which way is up and down. In space, this natural compass disappears. To enable their research, the team simulate microgravity by continuously rotating the plants. Gravity then pulls equally in all directions so that each side gets activated continuously and it doesn’t know where up and down is.

The psychological benefits of fresh food extend far beyond nutrition. Many humans get a great psychological benefit in watching and guiding plants to grow. The pre-cooked, often mushy food presented to astronauts can be fine for short periods but it could become a serious concern for longer duration missions. The stress-reducing effects of gardening and fresh food could be crucial for maintaining astronaut mental health during years-long missions to Mars.

Astronauts on trips to Mars will need more nutritional and psychologically satisfying food. (Credit : Kavin Gill)

Nine months into the project, preliminary results are promising. The researchers are successfully creating rice varieties that could transform how we think about food production in extreme environments. Whether feeding astronauts on Mars or communities in Earth’s harshest regions, these super dwarf, nutrient rich crops represent a future where fresh food isn’t limited by location, even if that location is another planet.

Source : Lunar Astronauts Could Eat “Moon Rice”

Insider Brief

• Physicists from Hebrew University and Cornell University have developed a laser-based method to protect atomic spins from environmental noise, significantly improving their stability and enabling more precise quantum sensing technologies.
• The technique uses a single, tuned laser to synchronize the spin precession of cesium atoms, achieving a ninefold improvement in spin coherence even under frequent atomic collisions and without the need for extreme cooling.
• This advancement could enhance the performance of quantum sensors, magnetometers, and navigation systems, offering a practical approach for real-world deployment of spin-based quantum devices.

PRESS RELEASE — A team of physicists from the Hebrew University’s Department of Applied Physics and Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, in collaboration with the School of Applied and Engineering Physics at Cornell University, has unveiled a powerful new method to shield atomic spins from environmental “noise”—a major step toward improving the precision and durability of technologies like quantum sensors and navigation systems.

The study, “Optical Protection of Alkali-Metal Atoms from Spin Relaxation,” by Avraham Berrebi, Mark Dikopoltsev, Prof. Ori Katz (Hebrew University), and Prof. Or Katz (Cornell University), has been published in Physical Review Letters and can potentially revolutionize fields that depend on magnetic sensing and atomic coherence.

Why This Matters

Atoms with unpaired electrons—such as those in cesium vapor—have a property of “spin”, strongly interact with magnetic fields and therefore be used for ultra-sensitive measurements of magnetic fields, gravity, and even brain activity. But these spins are notoriously fragile. Even the tiniest disturbance from surrounding atoms or container walls can cause them to lose their orientation, a process known as spin relaxation. Until now, protecting these spins from such interference has required complicated setups or worked only under very specific conditions.

The new method changes that.

Laser Light as a Shield

The researchers developed a technique that uses a single, precisely tuned laser beam to synchronize the precession of atomic spins in magnetic field—even as the atoms constantly collide with one another and their surroundings.

Imagine a scenario where hundreds of tiny spinning tops are confined within a box. Typically, the interactions between these tops can disrupt their spin configurations, causing the entire system to fall out of sync. This effect become much more dominate at high magnetic fields, as the tops process and change their orientation much more rapidly. However, a specific method utilizes light to maintain synchronization within the system, by addressing the differences in the various spin configuration, the light effectively keeps all the tops spinning in harmony, preventing disorder and enabling cooperative behaviour among the spinning entities even at high magnetic fields. This approach highlights the fascinating interplay between light and atomic spin dynamics.

The researchers achieved a ninefold improvement in how long cesium atoms maintained their spin orientation. Remarkably, this protection works even when the atoms are bouncing off special anti-relaxation-coated cell walls and experiencing frequent internal collisions.

Real-World Potential

This technique could significantly enhance devices that rely on atomic spins, including:

• Quantum sensors and magnetometers used in medical imaging, archaeology, and space exploration
• Precision navigation systems that don’t rely on GPS
• Quantum information platforms where spin stability is key to storing and processing information

Because the method works in “warm” environments and doesn’t require extreme cooling or complicated field tuning, it could be more practical for real-world applications than existing approaches.

A New Frontier in Atomic Physics

“This approach opens a new chapter in protecting quantum systems from noise,” said the researchers. “By harnessing the natural motion of atoms and using light as a stabilizer, we can now preserve coherence across a broader range of conditions than ever before.”

The research builds on decades of work in atomic physics, but this simple, elegant solution—using light to coordinate atoms—is a leap forward. It may pave the way for more robust, accurate, and accessible quantum technologies in the near future.

The research paper titled “Optical Protection of Alkali-Metal Atoms from Spin Relaxation” is now published in Physical Review Letters and can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1103/fncz-b3yy

Researchers:

Avraham Berrebi¹, Mark Dikopoltsev^1,2, Ori Katz¹, and Or Katz³

 Institutions:

1. Department of Applied Physics, The Faculty of Science, The Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
2. Refael Ltd.
3. School of Applied and Engineering Physics, Cornell University