Condensed concepts

What shapes the emergence and influence of a specific new academic discipline or research field? How much does context matter? How is the discipline defined? By the objects studied, methods used, central concepts, questions asked, goals, or key discoveries? And, who gets to define the discipline: text-book authors, current researchers, distinguished academics, or university managers? It may depend on who you ask. A discipline can be viewed from intellectual, historical, institutional, political, economic, and sociological perspectives. It all depends on what questions you ask. Arguably, for most of the twentieth-century physics was considered the dominant field of science. We also observe today that condensed matter physics is a dominant force in physics. This is reflected in many different measures, such as numbers of practitioners, journal articles, PhDs, citations, and Nobel Prizes. How did this happen?  Joseph Martin is a historian who explores this question in his 2018 book, Solid

The mere formulation of a problem is far more essential than its solution , which may be merely a matter of mathematical or experimental skills. To raise new questions , new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science. I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld (1938), The Evolution of Physics I recently encountered this quotation in The Poetry and Music of Science: Comparing Creativity in Science and Art by Tom McLeish. I have heard many times the "Imagination is more important than knowledge" quote, sometimes as a dubious justification for dubious ideas. However, I did not know the context.  My postdoctoral advisor, John Wilkins tried to drill into me, the idea in the first paragraph, that just coming up with a well-defined formulation of a probl

Perfect crystals are elastic. When a stress is applied and then removed the crystal will bounce back to its original shape. However, in reality no crystal is perfect. If the applied stress is too large the crystal will fracture. Understanding fracture is a big deal in materials science and involves some fascinating physics, including the role of topological defects.  There are two distinct properties: elasticity and plasticity . They are associated with temporary and permanent changes in shape in response to an applied stress. They are quantified by the elastic stiffness and the tensile strength, respectively. They reflect material properties at quite different length scales.  A beautiful and accessible short introduction is  Stressed out crystals Bart Kahr & Michael D. Ward  This is a commentary of some work by a few of my UQ chemistry colleagues, who have made and studied a molecular crystal that is incredibly flexible, as seen in this movie. Atomic resolution of structural chan

I think it is amazing how in the universe we see diverse and beautiful patterns and structures. Even relatively simple systems can self-organise to produce things one would not expect or predict. Consider clouds, turbulent flows, leopard spots, a tree leaf, spiral galaxies, biological cells... It is also amazing and beautiful that we can develop relatively simple mathematical models that can produce similar patterns. This is emergence! Here is a beautiful example that recently came to my attention. The associated PRL is Faraday-Wave Contact-Line Shear Gradient Induces Streaming and Tracer Self-Organization: From Vortical to Hedgehoglike Patterns Héctor Alarcón, Matías Herrera-Muñoz, Nicolas Périnet, Nicolás Mujica, Pablo Gutiérrez, and Leonardo Gordillo There is also a Physics story too.

“Fortunately, the majority of gentlemen who are persuaded to steal things don’t really know a huge amount about science” This is a choice quote in a fascinating article,  New Australian technology tracks down gold thieves and blood diamonds  ["New tech to trace dodgy diamonds" in the print edition] in the Australian Financial Review (AFR) Weekend. It describes the work of John Watling, Chief Scientist at the company Source Certain.  Basically by measuring the relative amounts of different trace elements [chemical impurities] in a sample of gold or diamond one can determine what mine that it has come from.