Combining artificial intelligence and quantum mechanics, researchers at Princeton have simulated what happens at the molecular level when water freezes. The result is the most complete yet simulation of the first steps in ice “nucleation,” a process important for climate and weather modeling.

A new survey of the night sky has observed dark matter — the mysterious substance that makes up more than a quarter of the universe but emits no light of its own — as it existed 12 billion years ago, not long after the universe began. This oldest-ever snapshot of dark matter in the universe offers the tantalizing possibility that the…

Princeton professors Elliott Lieb and Mark Braverman were among those honored today for significant contributions to mathematics and affiliated fields by the International Mathematical Union (IMU) in Helsinki, Finland.

Lieb, the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics, Emeritus, and Professor of…

Princeton University mathematician June Huh was awarded today the 2022 Fields Medal, one of the most prestigious awards in mathematics, in recognition of his work in combinatorics. The International Mathematical Union (IMU) presents the medal every four years to researchers under the age of 40 based on…

New Princeton research shows that prehistoric megatooth sharks, the biggest sharks that ever lived, were apex predators at the highest level ever measured.

Megatooth sharks get their name from their massive teeth, which can each be bigger than a human hand. The group includes Megalodon, the largest shark that ever lived, as well as…

The 2022 Shaw Prize in Mathematical Sciences was awarded in equal shares to mathematicians Noga Alon of Princeton University and Ehud Hrushovski of Oxford, "for their remarkable contributions to discrete mathematics and model theory with interaction notably with…

A recent experiment detailed in the journal Nature is challenging our picture of how electrons behave in quantum materials. Using stacked layers of a material called tungsten ditelluride, researchers have observed electrons in two dimensions behaving as if they were in a single…

Physicists have discovered that electrons in a crystal form counter-intuitive quantum links that are knotted. In explaining these phenomena, researchers turned to knot theory, a branch of mathematics that studies the complex world of knots and loops. This is the first time that knot theory has been used to understand materials called topological magnets, and the application of this theory promises to expand our knowledge of the quantum mechanics of materials.

Just as it’s hard to understand a conversation without knowing its context, it can be difficult for biologists to grasp the significance of gene expression without knowing a cell’s environment. To solve that problem, researchers at Princeton Engineering have developed a method to elucidate a cell’s surroundings so that biologists can make more…

The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters has awarded the 2022 Abel Prize to Dennis Sullivan, a 1966 Ph.D. graduate of Princeton, “for his groundbreaking contributions to topology in its broadest sense, and in particular its algebraic, geometric and dynamical…