Sometimes you think you have a complete understanding of something and then BOOM—a simple problem throws everything out the window. Let's consider a very basic physics problem involving pushing a ...

Memory fault: friction study could provide new insights into why earthquakes happen. (Courtesy: iStock/allanswort) Experiments by Sam Dillavou and Shmuel Rubinstein at Harvard University have, for the ...

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Friction is a force that exists when two surfaces rub up against each other. For example, this cup on ...

I learned to respect friction, as a phenomenon with many nuances, when I was a graduate student. One day, while teaching a problem session in elementary mechanics, I unwisely invented a new problem to ...

Although robotic devices are used in everything from assembly lines to medicine, engineers have a hard time accounting for the friction that occurs when those robots grip objects - particularly in wet ...

Heh, maybe the problem is the premise. What real surface made of matter would even come close to this? Strikes me too as a case of theoreticians being wankers. Maybe I'm unimaginative, but I can't see ...

The next time you ride an escalator, notice this: the handrail always seems to move faster than the stairs. It’s not broken — it’s physics. Tiny differences in roller tension, belt friction, and ...

MIT scientists have coaxed atoms into an exotic “edge state” for the first time, allowing them to flow completely friction-free. The breakthrough could lead to better superconductor materials. As ...