I learned in October 2022’s Breakthrough that the spikes of stars in high-power photos are called diffraction spikes. Why do they appear as two crosses at 45 degrees to each other? The diffraction ...

When two or more light waves interact with one another, they result in the formation of different interference patterns. British physicist Thomas Young first demonstrated and explained these patterns ...

Auroras, shimmering bands of light that shoot through the night sky near the Earth’s poles, can follow patterns known as arcs ...

Quantum physics is the realm of the strange. And one of the strangest discoveries in the field is also one of the most fundamental: Particles fired at barriers with two slits in them can act like ...

A new optical device allows researchers to generate and switch between two stable, donut-shaped light patterns called skyrmions. These light vortices hold their shape even when disturbed, making them ...