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08/01/07

Plutonium

Atomic element 94 was named “plutonium” after Pluto, the ninth planet from the Sun (now demoted to “minor planet” status.) By tradition, plutonium should have been assigned the symbol “Pl,” but co-discoverer Glenn Seaborg gave it the symbol “Pu” as

08/01/07

SCI-Arc

Asked to design a lab and office complex, students found inspiration in particle collisions, gushers of data, and the shifty habits of neutrinos.

08/01/07

Number crunching, redefined

Supercomputers can play chess, map DNA, and aid in the study of dark energy. But recently they were unleashed on a bold new frontier: optimizing the production of potato chips.

08/01/07

Dark energy

Dark energy, the weirdest and most abundant stuff in the universe, is causing the expansion of the universe to speed up.

08/01/07

Raising MoNA

In the olden days, farmers would travel for miles through the American countryside to help neighbors raise a barn.

08/01/07

Particle search on a shoestring

When Aaron Chou heard about an experiment in Italy that suggested the existence of an exotic particle as a candidate for dark matter, he was intrigued enough to go looking for it. His first stop: the Fermilab cafeteria.

08/01/07

What, no popcorn?

Though scientists are skeptical of the suggested particle's existence, the results from Legnaro need to be checked, says Chou, who strayed from his usual area of research–cosmology– to help put the project together. "It's unlikely but not impossible.