Volume 14 Issue 3, March 2018

New developments in spintronics based on antiferromagnetic materials show promise for improved fundamental understanding and applications in technology.

For a system to exhibit spiral patterns one would expect its parts to behave synchronously, as in a Mexican wave. Proving the contrary, chemical oscillators have now been observed in a state comprising a spiral surrounding an asynchronous core.

Understanding how some single cells evolved into multicellular life means figuring out how they overcome the stresses associated with crowding as they multiply. New insights from yeast suggest that changes in the shape of cells may provide an answer.

Classical wave-driven particles can mimic basic quantum properties, but how far this parallel extends is yet to be seen. Evidence for quantum-like mirages in a system of droplets moving on a fluid surface pushes the analogy into many-body territory.

An ultracold mixture of Bose gases is eight orders of magnitude more dilute than water. However, quantum fluctuations turn it into a self-bound liquid droplet.

As part of a Focus on antiferromagnetic spintronics, this Perspective looks at the complex and often faster dynamics of antiferromagnetic spin textures.

As part of a Focus on antiferromagnetic spintronics, this Perspective examines the opportunities afforded by synthetic, as opposed to crystalline, antiferromagnets.

As part of a focus on antiferromagnetic spintronics, this Review considers the role of spin transport and spin torque in potential antiferromagnetic memory devices.

An overview of how electromagnetic radiation can be used for probing and modification of the magnetic order in antiferromagnets, and possible future research directions.

Topological states of various kinds may find application in spintronic devices. The authors review recent progress in this area.

Attosecond light pulses are used to probe ultrafast processes. The experimental observation of attosecond electron pulses now promises the marriage of these techniques with electron microscopy and diffraction.

The effect of blackbody radiation is expected to be very weak. The acceleration due to the attractive optical forces from blackbody radiation is measured in an atom interferometer and, surprisingly, it dominates gravity and radiation pressure

Multiphoton superradiance is observed in a nuclear system excited by an X-ray free-electron laser. Tracking the system decay photon by photon shows strong enhancement of the first photon’s decay rate, in good agreement with Dicke’s formulation.

Non-equilibrium signatures of topology—the appearance, movement and annihilation of vortices in a cold-atom system—are identified, showing that topological phase can emerge dynamically from a non-topological state.

An ultracold quantum gas experiment shows that, when it crosses the many-body phase transition, the original ground state can evolve coherently into the new emergent phase, reflecting the initial global coherence presented in the system.

Exploiting the magnetic field-induced shift of entropy in certain molecular salts when going from 1D short-range ordering to a 3D quantum critical point could provide a route for producing strongly fluctuating quantum materials.

Atomically thin chromium tri-iodide is shown to be a 2D ferromagnetic insulator with an optical response dominated by ligand-field transitions, emitting circularly polarized photoluminescence with a helicity determined by the magnetization direction.

A spiral chimera state, composed by an ordered spiral surrounding a core of asynchronous oscillators, is revealed in a large grid of chemical oscillators.

Understanding how single cells evolved into multicellular organisms requires knowledge of the physical constraints on the evolution of cell clusters. Evidence that an evolution in cell shape delays fracturing offers a route to increased complexity.

Theory and experiment show that quantum correlations violate the instrumental test—a common statistical method used to estimate the strength of causal relationships between two variables.

Although predicted to occur in planetary interiors, superionic water ice has proved elusive to identify experimentally. Laser-driven shock-compression experiments on water ice VII now verify its existence.

Large spin–orbit coupling can be induced when graphene interfaces with semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides, leading to strongly anisotropic spin dynamics. As a result, orientation-dependent spin relaxation is observed.

Nanomagnets are often used to build artificial systems that are geometrically frustrated, but when quasiperiodic ordering is introduced, an unusual ground state can form, with an ordered skeletal structure surrounding groups of degenerate macrospins.

Droplets moving on the surface of a vibrating fluid bath mimic the behaviour of electrons in quantum corrals. Introducing submerged features in the bath can even drive the droplets to excite modes that induce effects reminiscent of quantum mirages.

How do you define colour? Nina Meinzer casts light on the vision it takes.