Physics Today

Biodegradable batteries have been tested in animal models as a safer alternative for powering ingestible medical devices. The battery-powered devices survived for three days in a pig’s stomach before beginning to safely dissolve. #biophysics

Using long-exposure images from five small telescopes, amateur astronomer Peter Goodhew created an image of a textbook astronomical bow shock. It likely formed after a stellar wind collided with an interstellar medium and excited ionized oxygen and hydrogen. #BackScatter

Throughout his career in software, Nilanjan P. Choudhury kept his passion for physics and theater. His latest play, Invisible Particles, debuting next year, explores the erased histories of two pioneering women physicists: Austria’s Marietta Blau and India’s Bibha Chowdhuri.

AIP archivist Allison Buser has just published a paper showing how many women volunteers contributed to the development of an early “big science” project to collect weather observations from across America. #Meteorology #ScienceHistory #WomenInScience

As longtime science and technology leaders Vint Cerf and France Córdova argue, ongoing dialogue is needed to ensure that the infrastructure supporting science is able to keep up with rapid change in the tools for scientific discovery.

Matthew Inman took a break from his physics studies to fly commercial planes. He ended up staying in aviation and could be your pilot the next time you fly. #whatcanphysicistsdo

Career mobility is an important factor in understanding the employment experiences of trans and nonbinary individuals in the physical sciences.

FYI Science Policy News - What's Ahead- Week of Oct. 19 www.aip.org/fyi/the-week... - China committee proposes rewarding universities for strong research security - DHS proposes changing prior status deference - NIH considers hiding peer review scores and moar

Here's the original @physicstoday.aip.org article by the researchers!

@physicstoday.aip.org FYI science policy news - Agencies pull “political interference” protections from scientific-integrity policies - Court temporarily blocks rule ending “duration of status” system physicstoday.aip.org/news/fyi-sci...

As a NASA project manager, Jennifer Inman supports human spaceflight by working on everything from nitty-gritty calculations to agreements between space agencies. “Working on something bigger than ourselves brings out the best in humanity,” she says. #whatcanphysicistsdo

FYI Science Policy News: NASA Funding Delays Raise Alarms for Researchers www.aip.org/fyi/nasa-fun... Approved grants face extra reviews and delays, and observers fear a behind-the-scenes installation of proposed political reviews. #NASA

“IceCube grew out of ideas developed in the early 1960s,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Spencer Klein -- who worked on IceCube alongside Francis Halzen starting in the 2000s. “It’s worked far better than we could ever have expected when we were getting started.”

GPS spoofing, the practice of falsifying location data, is becoming more common and harder to prevent, writes @sarah-wells.bsky.social`. Researchers have proposed and tested a new approach that uses messages encoded in quantum states to authenticate an entity’s position.

Can the US dodge a dystopia in which political appointees micromanage science? Congress has put a hold on a rule proposed by the Office of Management and Budget that would create such a scenario, and now the science community is working for the rule to either be choked or left to fizzle out.

Congratulations to Henri B. Kagan and Kensō Soai, the laureates of the 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry! They are sharing the award equally for their work on designing reactions that selectively form only one enantiomer of a chiral molecule. Read the ACS press release: www.acs.org/pressroom/ne...

Henri B. Kagan at Paris-Saclay University, and Kenso Soai at the Tokyo University of Science have won this year’s #NobelPrize in Chemistry “for the discovery of non-linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis.” Read more: cen.acs.org/people/nobel... #ChemNobel #chemsky 🧪

BREAKING NEWS The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the 2026 #NobelPrize in Chemistry to Henri B. Kagan and Kenso Soai “for the discovery of non-linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis.”

The @scienceacademyswe.bsky.social announced today that Francis Halzen will receive the 2026 @nobelprize.org in Physics “for decisive contributions to @icecubeneutrino.bsky.social and the discovery of high-energy neutrinos of astrophysical origin.” Read the full story by Laura Fattaruso. #physics

I attended a seminar by freshly minted Nobel Laureate Francis Halzen many years ago and something he said stuck with me, but it takes some explaining, so this will be a (short) thread. The talk was about neutrino telescopes, and he started by explaining how rarely neutrinos interact with anything.

Physics Today -- Science organizations mobilize against politicizing purse strings physicstoday.aip.org/news/science... Related -- The last crisis of U.S. physics - physicstoday.aip.org/features/the...

Congratulations to Francis Halzen, founder of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, for receiving the Nobel Prize in physics. Halzen is recognised for his contributions to neutrino astrophysics, using the observatory at the South Pole that he proposed and led. ☄️🔭⚛️🧪 www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physi...

See here for lots of neutrino content... www.nature.com/collections/...

I am so happy today for Francis Halzen and for the IceCube collaboration. The Nobel Prize for Francis, for IceCube, and for high-energy neutrino astronomy is very special for me, both scientifically and personally.

"This was the kind of adventure where success was not guaranteed and we got lucky," said Francis Halzen after learning that he would receive the 2026 @nobelprize.org in Physics for his contributions to @icecubeneutrino.bsky.social. Here's our story, which will be updated throughout the day. #physics

Congratulations to Professor Francis Halzen and everyone working at the IceCube Neutrino Observatory for this recognition! #NobelPrize

Let's explore the IceCube Neutrino Observatory! Constructed at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica, it embeds ~5,800 ultra-sensitive light detectors (DOMs) in 90 strings through 1 cubic km of ultra-clear glacier ice sitting at very nearly the precise geographic South Pole.

What is the IceCube neutrino observatory? Neutrinos are elusive particles that rarely interact, but can create flashes of light when they do. Most neutrino detectors are giant water tanks surrounded by light detectors. IceCube is kilometer-long strings of detectors embedded in the Antarctic ice.

Since it came online in 2010, @icecubeneutrino.bsky.social has been covered extensively in @physicstoday.aip.org. In 2013 it was discussed in relation to the search for hypothetical WIMPs—weakly interacting massive particles.

In May 2008, Francis Halzen and Spencer Klein authored a feature article for @physicstoday.aip.org on several experiments in neutrino astrophysics, including @icecubeneutrino.bsky.social. physicstoday.aip.org/features/ast...

The IceCube neutrino detector has won the 2026 Nobel Prize in physics. The Trump administration has proposed slashing its budget in half in 2027.

Amazing news for neutrinos, and I am very happy for Francis and for the IceCube collaboration!

Could we use cosmic neutrinos to contact extra-galactic civilizations? "This has already been proposed by several friends of mine. It has been speculated that this would be an ideal way to communicate with aliens but I don't think I will go there." - Francis Halzen, 2026 physics #NobelPrize 🧪⚛️

Nobel Prize Laureate Francis Halzen: ”This was a kind of adventure and success was not guaranteed. Many talented people joined me, and thats why I’m here." ⚛️ Our warmest congratulations! Read the popular science background to this year’s #NobelPrize in Physics at: www.kva.se/nobelphysics2026

Oh look, US National Science Foundation-supported science won the Nobel Prize in physics.

Such a good Nobel Prize! Francis Halzen is a great person, and “let’s turn the Antarctic ice sheet into a neutrino detector” is the kind of idea that deserves a Prize if you can pull it off.

The impressive list of #NobelPrizes in physics related to neutrinos 🧪⚛️: 1988 - discovery of muon neutrino 🚨 1995 - detection of neutrino 💡 2002 - detection of cosmic neutrinos 🎇 2015 - neutrino oscillations 🌊 2026 - discovery of high-energy cosmic neutrinos 💥

We spoke with Francis Halzen and his colleagues then via a Google Hangout (remember those?). You can watch that conversation on YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3BI...

”I hope this reflects on the really courageous people who joined me in the beginning of this project when no respectable conservative physicists would have joined me, but many talented people did, and that's why I'm here.” - physics laureate Francis Halzen speaking at today's prize announcement.

The exceedingly rare solo Nobel! I'm sure this won't be controversial in the least...

Sign-off from the Nobel Prize secretary to the winner of the Physics Prize: "Have a nice day"