Rajeev Acharya, Dmitry A. Abanin and Laleh Aghababaie-Beni
Google Quantum AI demonstrated a superconducting surface-code memory whose logical error rate decreases as the code distance grows, crossing below the fault-tolerance threshold. Scaling from distance-3 to distance-5 to distance-7 codes, the logical qubit's error per cycle was suppressed by roughly a factor of two per increment, showing exponential error suppression. This provides experimental evidence that the surface code can reach the regime needed for scalable fault-tolerant quantum computing.
Using JWST/NIRSpec observations from the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES), the authors obtained spectroscopic confirmation of two unusually luminous galaxies, JADES-GS-z14-0 and JADES-GS-z14-1, at redshifts of about 14. These are among the most distant galaxies ever spectroscopically confirmed, existing roughly 290–300 million years after the Big Bang. Their brightness challenges pre-JWST models of how rapidly luminous galaxies could form in the early universe.
Dolev Bluvstein, Simon J. Evered and Alexandra A. Geim
The authors demonstrated a programmable quantum processor using reconfigurable arrays of neutral atoms that operates on encoded logical qubits rather than physical ones. They ran error-correcting codes, performed logical entangling operations and algorithms on dozens of logical qubits, and showed that increasing code distance improved logical performance. The work is a key step toward fault-tolerant quantum computation with atom arrays.
Gabriella Agazie, Akash Anumarlapudi and Anne M. Archibald
Using 15 years of pulsar timing data from a 67-pulsar array, the NANOGrav Collaboration reported evidence for a stochastic gravitational-wave background at nanohertz frequencies. The team detected the characteristic spatial cross-correlation (Hellings-Downs) signature expected for such a background across pulsar pairs, at a significance of roughly 3 to 4 sigma. The signal is consistent with a population of inspiraling supermassive black hole binaries, though exotic cosmological sources are not excluded.
This SH0ES Team paper presents a refined local measurement of the Hubble constant using Hubble Space Telescope observations of Cepheid variables calibrating Type Ia supernovae. By expanding and improving the distance-ladder sample, the authors achieve roughly 1 km/s/Mpc total uncertainty. The result reinforces the significant tension with the Hubble constant inferred from the early-universe CMB.
Researchers at the National Ignition Facility reported reaching a burning-plasma regime in laser-driven inertial confinement fusion, where alpha-particle self-heating from fusion reactions becomes the dominant heating mechanism in the deuterium-tritium fuel. Using improved hohlraum and capsule designs, several experiments crossed into this state, producing substantially higher fusion energy yields. The work marked a key milestone on the path toward ignition.
Using a superconducting quantum processor, the team prepared the ground state of the toric code, a paradigmatic topologically ordered state, on a 2D lattice of qubits. They demonstrated the topological nature of the state by creating and braiding anyonic excitations and measuring nontrivial topological entanglement entropy. The work showed that programmable quantum hardware can realize and probe states with intrinsic topological order.
The Fermilab Muon g-2 Collaboration reported its first measurement of the positive muon's anomalous magnetic moment with 0.46 ppm precision. The result was consistent with the earlier Brookhaven measurement, and the combined experimental value showed a tension of about 4.2 sigma with the Standard Model theoretical prediction. This hinted at possible physics beyond the Standard Model.
The team demonstrates Gaussian boson sampling with a photonic quantum computer named Jiuzhang, detecting up to 76 output photons from a 100-mode interferometer. The resulting output distribution spans an enormous Hilbert space, and they estimate the sampling task would take classical supercomputers astronomically longer, providing a photonics-based demonstration of quantum computational advantage. This complemented the earlier superconducting-qubit supremacy result with a distinct physical platform.
This paper presents the cosmological parameter constraints from the final (2018) Planck satellite analysis of cosmic microwave background temperature and polarization anisotropies plus lensing. The data are well fit by a six-parameter flat Lambda-CDM model, yielding precise values for the matter density, baryon density, and other parameters. The inferred Hubble constant from the CMB is in tension with local distance-ladder measurements.
Google's team uses a 53-qubit programmable superconducting processor (Sycamore) to perform random quantum circuit sampling, a task chosen to be classically hard. They report sampling the output of a pseudo-random circuit in about 200 seconds, estimating that a leading classical supercomputer would need an impractically long time for the equivalent task, thereby claiming the first demonstration of quantum computational supremacy.
A. P. Drozdov, P. P. Kong, V. S. Minkov and M. I. Eremets
The authors synthesized lanthanum superhydride (LaH10) at pressures around 170 GPa and measured a superconducting transition at temperatures up to about 250 K. Evidence including the magnitude of Tc reduction in a magnetic field and an isotope effect supported phonon-mediated, conventional superconductivity. This represented a new record approaching room-temperature superconductivity in compressed hydrides.
This is the first paper in the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) series presenting the first image of a supermassive black hole, located at the center of the galaxy M87. Using global very long baseline interferometry at 1.3 mm, the collaboration resolved a bright ring of emission surrounding a central dark region, the black hole shadow. The observations are consistent with a Kerr black hole of mass about 6.5 billion solar masses.
The CMS Collaboration at the CERN LHC reported the observation of the Standard Model Higgs boson decaying to a pair of bottom quarks, the dominant predicted decay channel. The analysis focused on Higgs bosons produced in association with a W or Z boson (VH) in 13 TeV proton-proton collision data from 2017. Combined with earlier 7, 8, and 13 TeV measurements, the result yielded an excess at 125 GeV exceeding 5 standard deviations, establishing the decay.
Following the detection of a high-energy muon neutrino (IceCube-170922A) by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, follow-up observations across the electromagnetic spectrum identified a spatially coincident gamma-ray flare from the blazar TXS 0506+056. The joint detection provided the first compelling evidence associating a high-energy astrophysical neutrino with a specific source, identifying blazars as cosmic-ray accelerators. The work is a landmark in multimessenger astronomy.
Yuan Cao, Valla Fatemi, Shiang Fang, Kenji Watanabe, Takashi Taniguchi, Efthimios Kaxiras, et al.
The authors stacked two graphene sheets twisted by a 'magic' angle of about 1.1 degrees, producing flat electronic bands in the resulting moire superlattice. Upon electrostatically doping near half-filling of these flat bands, they observed superconductivity with critical temperatures up to about 1.7 K. The behaviour resembles that of unconventional, strongly correlated superconductors such as the cuprates, demonstrating a tunable platform for studying correlated electron physics.
Yuan Cao, Valla Fatemi, Ahmet Demir, Shiang Fang, Spencer L. Tomarken, Jason Y. Luo, et al.
This companion paper reports that twisted bilayer graphene at the magic angle exhibits insulating states at half-filling of the flat moire bands, where simple band theory would predict a metal. The authors interpret these as Mott-like correlated insulators arising from strong electron-electron interactions in the nearly flat bands. The result demonstrates that twist-angle engineering can drive graphene into strongly correlated electronic phases.
Hannes Bernien, Sylvain Schwartz, Alexander Keesling, Harry Levine, Ahmed Omran, Hannes Pichler, et al.
The authors built a programmable quantum simulator using up to 51 individually trapped neutral atoms coupled to Rydberg states via optical tweezers. By tuning interactions they probed quantum many-body dynamics in a regime inaccessible to classical computation, observing the emergence of ordered antiferromagnetic phases and unexpectedly persistent, slowly relaxing oscillations after a quench. These long-lived coherent revivals later became understood as a signature of quantum many-body scars.
This paper reports the first detection of gravitational waves from the inspiral of a binary neutron star system, event GW170817, observed on 17 August 2017 by Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo. The signal lasted far longer than previous black-hole mergers, consistent with low-mass compact objects. The detection, coincident with a short gamma-ray burst and subsequent electromagnetic follow-up, inaugurated multimessenger astronomy with gravitational waves.
Barry Bradlyn, L. Elcoro, Jennifer Cano, M. G. Vergniory, Zhijun Wang, C. Felser, et al.
The authors develop a complete framework linking the symmetry properties of electronic bands to topological character, merging group theory of crystallographic space groups with band structure analysis. By cataloguing how atomic orbitals at Wannier centers transform under crystal symmetries, they identify which band structures are topologically trivial (atomic limit) versus topologically nontrivial. This enabled systematic, predictive identification of topological materials from symmetry data alone.
Wladimir A. Benalcazar, B. Andrei Bernevig and Taylor L. Hughes
The paper generalizes the theory of electric polarization to higher electric multipole moments (quadrupole and octupole), showing these can be topologically quantized bulk observables in crystalline insulators. It introduces tight-binding models whose gapped edges are themselves lower-dimensional topological phases, producing protected, fractionally charged corner states. This work effectively launched the field of higher-order topological insulators.
J. Zhang, P. W. Hess, A. Kyprianidis and C. Monroe
The authors experimentally realize a discrete (Floquet) time crystal using a chain of trapped atomic ions driven periodically into a many-body-localized regime. The system spontaneously breaks the discrete time-translation symmetry of the drive, exhibiting a subharmonic oscillation at a period that is a rational multiple of the drive period. This rigid, period-doubled response persists despite perturbations to the drive, confirming the predicted time-crystalline phase.
This paper reported the first direct detection of gravitational waves, recorded on 14 September 2015 by the two LIGO interferometers as the signal GW150914. The observed waveform swept upward in frequency from 35 to 250 Hz and matched general-relativity predictions for the inspiral, merger, and ringdown of a binary black hole system, detected with a matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 24 and a significance greater than 5.1σ. The source was inferred to be the merger of black holes of about 36 and 29 solar masses into a final black hole of about 62 solar masses, radiating roughly 3 solar masses of energy as gravitational waves.
A. P. Drozdov, M. I. Eremets, I. A. Troyan, V. Ksenofontov and S. I. Shylin
The authors compressed hydrogen sulfide (H2S) to extreme pressures around 150 GPa, forming a hydrogen-rich phase believed to be H3S, and observed a sharp drop in resistance signalling superconductivity at up to 203 K. A pronounced isotope effect upon deuterium substitution indicated phonon-mediated, BCS-type (conventional) superconductivity. This set a record transition temperature at the time and validated theoretical predictions of high-Tc superconductivity in compressed hydrides.
The LHCb collaboration at CERN's Large Hadron Collider reported the observation of exotic structures in the J/ψp invariant-mass spectrum of Λ_b^0 baryon decays, interpreted as hidden-charm pentaquark states. Two resonant states, labelled Pc(4380)+ and Pc(4450)+, were identified with high statistical significance. The result provided the first compelling evidence for pentaquarks, baryon-like states composed of five quarks.
The ATLAS Collaboration reported the observation of a new neutral boson in searches for the Standard Model Higgs boson, using proton-proton collision data from the LHC corresponding to about 4.8 fb⁻¹ at √s = 7 TeV (2011) and 5.8 fb⁻¹ at √s = 8 TeV (2012). Combining sensitive decay channels, the analysis found an excess at a mass of about 126.0 GeV with a local significance of 5.9 standard deviations, consistent with the production and decay of a Standard Model Higgs boson. The result, announced jointly with a companion CMS measurement, provided experimental confirmation of the boson associated with the Brout–Englert–Higgs mechanism of electroweak symmetry breaking.
In this foundational paper ("On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies") Einstein introduced the special theory of relativity, building physics on two postulates: that the laws of physics are identical in all inertial frames and that the speed of light in vacuum is the same for all observers regardless of the motion of the source. From these he derived the Lorentz transformation kinematically, abolishing the need for a luminiferous ether and showing that simultaneity, lengths, and time intervals are relative to the observer's frame of reference. The work reconciled mechanics with Maxwell's electrodynamics and established time dilation and length contraction as physical consequences of the structure of spacetime.