Word: basically
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Science In physics, a bizarre new Theory of Everything claims that the four basic forces are composed of tiny pulsing strings...
Like members of a family, the four basic forces of nature are all distinct personalities, with their separate quirks, abilities and housekeeping chores. Electromagnetism makes it possible for elevators to rise, light bulbs to glow and lightning to snake across the sky. Gravity holds chairs to the floor and planets in their orbital paths. The strong force binds together the protons and neutrons in an atomic nucleus. The weak force causes subatomic particles to shoot out of the nuclei of atoms during the radioactive decay of such unstable elements as uranium...
...their search for a unifying theory, researchers found that they could make headway using quantum theory, in which the basic forces are transmitted through quanta, tiny packets of energy. The quanta, tossed like softballs between particles of matter, such as protons or electrons, account for the interaction between the particles. Electromagnetism, for example, had long been conceived as traveling in bundles of light known as photons. (In fact, Einstein had elaborated this concept in explaining the photoelectric effect, a feat that later won him the Nobel Prize in 1921.) More recently physicists conjured up hypothetical bits, called...
...guerrillas have carefully nurtured the repopulation of northern Morazán by restoring some basic services that collapsed when the government abandoned the area to the rebels. There is still no electricity or telegraph service. Buses have not been seen for five years, and consumer goods are scarce. But the rebels, through civilian "directorates" that now run the towns, have reopened schools, many of which had not conducted classes for four years. While most of the new teachers are recruited and paid by the directorates, four in Perquín are government employees. One of them, Esperanza Varela de Guevara, 47, moved...
...Fischbach is proved right, his hypothetical force, which he calls hypercharge, would be the fifth known basic force. (Four forces are known to exist: gravity; electromagnetism; the strong force, which binds the atomic nucleus; and the weak force, which is responsible for certain types of radioactivity.) Hypercharge, Fischbach reports in Physical Review Letters, is an extremely weak repulsive force that acts between objects no more than about 600 feet apart and varies in strength from element to element. It is strongest in iron and weakest in hydrogen. Thus, the physicists contend, if an iron ball and, say, a feather were...