Nature Physics

Nature Physics, Published online: 13 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0582-9

Publisher Correction: A primary radiation standard based on quantum nonlinear optics

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0549-x

Energy costs

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0556-y

Far from perfect

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0563-z

Three years have passed since the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, yet the country struggles to agree on a way forward. The uncertainty this creates is being felt across its research community.

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0542-4

Microtubules vary their length by gaining and shedding tubulin dimers dynamically at both ends. But evidence now suggests that dimers may also be incorporated into the middle of the shaft—calling into question existing models of growth dynamics.

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0530-8

The way that we understand free space has varied wildly since our first conception of the vacuum. And how we measure the void has proven just as changeable, as Karl Jousten explains.

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0538-0

The long spin lifetimes observed in polymeric semiconductors hold promise for potential applications. A careful study untangles the main mechanism behind them.

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0558-9

It’s magic

Nature Physics, Published online: 03 June 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0557-x

Stay in shape

Nature Physics, Published online: 28 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0569-6

Author Correction: Evolution of charge order topology across a magnetic phase transition in cuprate superconductors

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0532-6

This study presents a proposal for an all-optical method for manipulating chiral superconductors. Light pulses can switch the handedness of the chirality, potentially enabling controlled local writing of domain walls and associated Majorana modes.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0535-3

A collective excitation behaving as a single emergent entity, known as a quasiparticle, often becomes unstable when encountering a continuum of many-body excited states. However, under certain conditions, the result can be totally different.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0533-5

Strong quantum correlations in an ultracoherent optomechanical system are used to demonstrate a displacement sensitivity that is below the standard quantum limit.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0520-x

A unified theory for the conduction of heat in materials is derived and shown to account for both the limiting regimes of periodic crystals and aperiodic glasses.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0540-6

A theoretical analysis of exotic superconductors suggests that it is possible to manipulate the state of their order parameter with light. This will help engineer devices from topological superconductors by patterning regions with different orders.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0536-2

The Kondo effect—the screening of a magnetic impurity’s local moment by the electron Fermi sea in a metal—has been observed in a charge-insulating quantum spin liquid material, where the spinon excitations take the role of electrons.

Nature Physics, Published online: 27 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0537-1

According to the Unruh effect, for an accelerating observer the vacuum is filled with thermal radiation. Experiments now simulate this effect, recreating the statistics of Unruh radiation in the matter-wave field of a Bose–Einstein condensate.

Stress relaxation in epithelial monolayers is controlled by the actomyosin cortex

Stress relaxation in epithelial monolayers is controlled by the actomyosin cortex, Published online: 13 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0516-6

Stress relaxation in cell monolayers shows remarkable similarities with that of single cells, suggesting the rheology of epithelial tissues is mediated by the actomyosin cortex—with dynamics reminiscent of those on a cellular level.

The quest for quantum degeneracy

The quest for quantum degeneracy, Published online: 13 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0531-7

While Bose–Einstein condensates of atoms were achieved in the mid-1990s, extending the regime of quantum degeneracy to polar molecules took another two decades of dedicated work. The researchers that contributed to this achievement span many generations of students in many different laboratories around the world.

Orientational and directional locking of colloidal clusters driven across periodic surfaces

Orientational and directional locking of colloidal clusters driven across periodic surfaces, Published online: 13 May 2019; doi:10.1038/s41567-019-0515-7

Colloidal clusters are shown to undergo directional locking when driven across a patterned surface. The role of the Fourier components of the particle–surface interaction suggests a means of leveraging this behaviour for nanoscale manipulation.