News
EPJ H now explicitly invites submissions of tandem papers
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- Published on 14 February 2025
Encouraging physicists to actively engage with their discipline‘s history has long been a key goal of The European Physical Journal H: Historical Perspectives on Contemporary Physics (EPJ H). As part of these efforts, EPJ H now explicitly invites submissions of "tandem papers".
In their basic form, these are co-authored papers in which the physicist provides a state-of-the-art overview of a contemporary topic and the historian complements this with a historical contextualization. For examples of this, see the recent EPJH special issue on "History for Physics: Contextualizing modern developments in the foundations of quantum theory". In the future, we also welcome a wider variety of collaborations between historians and physicists. The Editorial Board explicitly also encourages expressions of interest in this format and offers support, both for individual researchers looking for suitable tandem partners (from history as well as from physics) and for pairs of researchers seeking to develop the tandem format.
For any inquiries, please reach out to Bernadette Lessel, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
EPJ ST Highlight - Dynamics of fluid flow on (and off) inclined fibres
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- Published on 10 February 2025
An empirical analysis of oil flowing down an inclined fibre has suggested how the structure and dynamics of droplet formation and drop-off is affected by the multiple forces involved in this deceptively simple phenomenon.
The commonplace phenomenon of liquid drops falling from a surface is, perhaps surprisingly, not yet fully understood by scientists. Understanding the complex interactions between the forces involved here would be helpful in industry, where structured packings in cooling towers must be designed to encourage droplet formation in fluid flow but coatings mixed to maintain a pristine, smooth surface. Furthermore, the design of meshes used to harvest clean water from fog or dew, where this is limited, relies on an understanding of how the water condenses on the fibres and drops into collection tanks.
Atefeh Pour Karimi, a PhD student at the Institute of Heat and Mass Transfer, Aachen University, Germany and her supervisors and collaborators have analysed the dynamics of this type of flow in detail and published their findings in the journal EPJ Special Topics (EPJ ST).
EPJ QT Highlight - Generating true randomness with quantum measurements
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- Published on 10 February 2025
A new approach can generate random information with extremely high efficiency through a process involving the emission and subsequent detection of single photons
From simulation to cryptography, randomness is a vital resource in many areas of technology. Ideally, random sequences can be created by measuring nondeterministic processes, whose outcomes are inherently unpredictable. Currently, many systems rely on pseudorandom processes such as thermal noise or chaotic oscillation, which exhibit some unpredictability, but are still fundamentally deterministic.
Through new research published in EPJ Quantum Technology, Jonas Almlöf and colleagues at Ericsson Research and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden, show how these challenges can be overcome by exploiting the inherently random principles of quantum mechanics.
Their approach offers a realistic route to generating completely unbiased random sequences of information, and also enables far greater efficiency compared to existing methods.
EPJ Web of Conferences Highlight – SQM 2024 - The 21st International Conference on Strangeness in Quark Matter
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- Published on 07 February 2025
The international conference on Strangeness in Quark Matter took place from 3 to 7 June, 2024, in Strasbourg, France.
This 2024 edition marked the 21st in the series and was held in France for the first time. It was also the first fully “in-person” edition since the pandemic. A total of 280 participants from 26 countries convened at the Palais de la Musique et des Congrès in Strasbourg to discuss recent experimental and theoretical advancements during a week-long programme including 210 oral and poster presentations.
EPJ ST Highlight - New call-to-action empathises scientists’ role in combating climate change
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- Published on 03 February 2025
This first paper published in the special issue on Energy Saving in Physics Research and Applications in EPJ Special Topics looks at the roles of science on universe and matter and digital transformation in the ongoing battle to reduce global temperature.
“Climate change is real.” That stark and undeniable statement spearheads a new call to action in a paper published in a special issue of EPJ Special Topics (EPJ ST), focusing on energy saving in physics research and applications. This call to action doesn’t outline a general package of measures and daily life recommendations to aid in efforts to limit rising global temperatures, rather it specifically focuses on the use of resources by scientists conducting research, particularly in the field of universe and matter. The paper advocates the use of digitisation methods to potentially offset resource consumption without sacrificing knowledge gains.
EPJ C: Markus Elsing new Editor-in-Chief for Computing, Software and Data Science
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- Published on 28 January 2025
The publishers of The European Physical Journal C – Particles and Fields are pleased to announce the appointment of Dr Markus Elsing as Editor-in-Chief for the newly created section on Computing, Software and Data Science as of January 2025.
Markus Elsing is a senior physicist at CERN. For over 20 years he has been leading the CERN group on Software and Computing in the ATLAS experiment. His main scientific interest is in pattern recognition, Machine Learning techniques and in precision physics at the LHC. He is organiser of the CERN Data Science Seminars and deputy-director of the CERN Schools of Physics.
EPJ D Topical Issue - Atomic Spectra and Oscillator Strengths (ASOS14)
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- Published on 27 January 2025
Guest Editors: Paul Indelicato, Stefan Schippers, Alexander Kramida, Glenn Wahlgren, Lydia Tchang-Brillet
The Topical Issue (TI), “Atomic spectra and oscillator strengths”, summarises the basic and primary atomic data needed in modelling a large variety of plasmas, covering radiative properties of atoms and atomic ions in different wavelength ranges going from X-ray to infrared (IR). These data find important applications in solar or stellar atmospheres and other astrophysical plasmas, and also in laboratory plasmas, such as fusion plasmas and laser-produced plasmas, among others.
EPJ B welcomes new Editor-in-Chief Philipp Hövel
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- Published on 20 January 2025
The European Physical Journal B is glad to announce that Dr. Philipp Hövel (Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany) has been appointed as Editor-in-Chief for the section on statistical physics and complex systems.
Dr. Hövel will work alongside Prof. Egger to continue guiding and developing the journal.
The journal and the Publishers, take the opportunity to thank Prof. Heiko Rieger whose work and leadership have been invaluable.
EPJ H Highlight - Personal reflections on the foundations of Lattice Gauge Theory
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- Published on 17 January 2025
Through a talk at the Lattice 2024 Conference in Liverpool, Dr John Kogut reflects on the early years of a theory which would come to play a pivotal role in modern physics
Lattice Gauge Theory (LGT) provides a mathematical framework for studying the properties of quarks, and the strong force which binds them together. John Kogut is a pioneer of LGT, and provided his perspectives on the foundations of the theory through a short talk at the Lattice 2024 Conference, now published in EPJ H: Historical Perspectives on Contemporary Physics.
EPJ H Highlight - Touschek and Gatto: exploring a friendship that would shape fundamental physics
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- Published on 15 January 2025
A review of personal exchanges and personal communications sheds new light on the collaboration between both researchers, which would lay the foundations for groundbreaking discoveries in particle physics
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) made its groundbreaking discovery of the Higgs Boson in 2012, but its ancestry can be traced back over 60 years to the first electron-positron collision experiment in Italy. Named Anello di Accumulazione (AdA), the experiment was the world’s first collider of matter and antimatter.
Through new research published in EPJ H: Historical Perspectives on Contemporary Physics, Luisa Bonolis, a historian of physics from MPIWG in Berlin, together with particle physicists Franco Buccella from INFN Roma1 and Giulia Pancheri at INFN Frascati Laboratories, tell the little-known story how AdA’s theoretical foundations were shaped by the collaboration between Bruno Touschek and Raoul Gatto: two pioneering physicists with a deep knowledge of the properties of fundamental particles.
