Physicists have measured the “skin” of an atom for the first time and, perhaps unsurprisingly, it is extremely thin. The measurement may help us understand the properties of neutron stars. Lead-208, ...

For three months in 2019, physicists blasted a beam of electrons at lead atoms that were held in place by foil made of diamond. The team was trying to determine the thickness of the neutron skin, the ...

Some atomic nuclei are thin-skinned — they’re surrounded by a slim shell of neutrons. Physicists now know how thick that neutron skin is for one particular type of nucleus. The skin of lead-208 — a ...

The European Space Agency is synching up atomic clocks with distant, rapidly spinning neutron stars, called pulsars, according to a release. The effort, led by a private company called GMV alongside ...

The creation of the lightest uranium atom ever gives scientists a better understanding of a fundamental type of radioactive decay. All elements have one or more isotopes, which differ from each other ...

Researchers have discovered eight new rare isotopes of the elements phosphorus, sulfur, chlorine, argon, potassium, scandium and, most importantly, calcium. These are the heaviest isotopes of these ...