Life emerged on Earth some 3.8 billion years ago. The “primordial soup theory” proposes that chemicals floating in pools of water, in the presence of sunlight and electrical discharge, spontaneously formed organic molecules. These building blocks of life underwent chemical reactions, likely driven by RNA, eventually leading to the formation of single cells. But what … More A New Clue to Multicellular Life
Graduate student-worker David Meer recently won the People’s Choice Award in the Gallery of Soft Matter 2025 at the American Physical Society Global Summit for his video titled “Protean Droplet Dynamics in Porous Media”. The video highlights research in progress at the Eric Weeks lab, in collaboration with the Corey O’Hern lab at Yale. Their research explores how … More Graduate student David Meer wins People’s Choice Award
Using theory as a microscope: Modeling multiprotein interactions at the actin filament barbed end Cells regulate the assembly and remodeling of actin networks with the help of numerous actin-binding proteins, many of which specifically target the barbed ends of actin filaments. Mechanistic insights into these processes have been challenging to obtain due to the difficulty … More Using theory as a microscope of the actin matrix
Graduate student Tianhong Lu and Prof. Luiz Santos from Emory Physics Department have made exciting discoveries about exotic quantum states in a special material called twisted bilayer MoTe₂. Their research, published in Physical Review Letters, explores how electrons in this material can form Fractional Chern Insulators (FCIs)—a rare type of quantum phase supporting fractional quasiparticles that … More Mapping the Physics of Moiré Quantum Materials
Emory University graduate student Ekram Towsif and Professor Shashank Shekhar have uncovered groundbreaking insights into the dynamics of actin filaments and the multifunctional actin-binding protein cyclase-associated protein (CAP). Using cutting-edge biophysical techniques, including microfluidics-assisted TIRF microscopy and multispectral single-molecule imaging, their research reveals CAP’s previously unknown role as a processive depolymerase at the barbed ends … More How to Unwind Both Ends of Actin Filaments
Prof. Shashank Shekhar, an Assistant Professor of Physics, has been named a “Cell Scientist to Watch” by the Journal of Cell Science. As a community-focused journal, Journal of Cell Science is particularly keen to support the next generation of cell biologists. The interview series Cell Scientists to Watch features talented researchers who have recently set … More Prof. Shashank Shekhar named “Cell Scientist to Watch”
In a recent paper in PRX Life, Prof. Nemenman and collaborators explore intrinsic motivation — the ability of biological or artificial agents to learn new skills without an explicit reward. They introduce a new method that can compute a certain quantity, called empowerment, which has been proposed as a good proxy for intrinsic motivation. Empowerment maximizes … More Doing Without Choosing: The Physics of Intrinsic Motivation
Mathematician, author, and radio producer Dr. Hannah Fry recently interviewed Prof. Justin Burton for her BBC radio program: Curious Cases. From space bubbles to secret bubble-juice recipes, this episode has it all! To read more about giant bubbles at Emory, read here: https://news.emory.edu/features/2020/01/physics-of-bubbles/index.html
Associate Professor Justin Burton was recently recognized with 2 separate acheivements for his scholarly research and contributions to the physics community. First, he was chosen as a Winship Distinguished Research Professor. Winship professors are tenured faculty (generally associate professors showing stellar progress toward promotion to full professor, or recently promoted full professors on a steep upward … More Prof. Justin Burton selected as a Winship Professor and receives APS Fellowship
Excited carriers in noble metal nanostructures have recently attracted considerable attention for photocatalysis, optical detection, and photonic circuitry. However, most nanoarchitectures fail to yield highly energetic carriers, which are usually necessary for these applications. The main reason for this bottleneck is the inefficiency of intraband carrier absorption in metals, dictated by momentum conservation. Due to … More Squeezing light strikes gold in photonics