Reference Terms
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Weapons of mass destruction
Weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a term used to describe a munition with the capacity to indiscriminately kill large numbers of living beings. The phrase broadly encompasses several areas of weapon synthesis, including nuclear, biological, chemical and, increasingly, radiological weapons.
The term first arose in 1937 in reference to the mass destruction of Guernica, Spain, by aerial bombardment. Following the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and progressing through the Cold War, the term came to refer more to non-conventional weapons. The phrase entered popular usage in relation to the U.S.-led 2003 invasion of Iraq. Terms used in a military context include atomic, biological, and chemical warfare (ABC warfare), nuclear, biological, and chemical (NBC) after the invention of the hydrogen bomb, and chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN), recognizing the threat of non-explosive radiological weapons.
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Matter & Energy News
July 13, 2026
July 13, 2026 Scientists at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore have discovered a surprisingly simple way to create exotic light structures called optical skyrmions using a 200-year-old optical effect known as the Poisson spot. Instead of relying on ...
July 12, 2026 Researchers have recreated the physics of extracting energy from a spinning black hole using a stationary device that produces synthetic ultrafast rotation. The achievement transforms a long-standing theoretical idea into a practical experiment and ...
July 11, 2026 Researchers discovered that electricity can dramatically reshape how heat flows through certain ceramic materials, increasing heat conduction by almost threefold in a preferred direction. The unexpected result could lead to much more efficient ...
July 11, 2026 Researchers have achieved a major milestone by creating a long-sought two-dimensional quantum material and confirming its unusual conducting edge states. The ability to control these states through ...
July 10, 2026 Researchers solved the mystery of how soft lithium dendrites crack the hard ceramic inside solid-state batteries, triggering short circuits. The breakthrough could help engineers build safer, longer-lasting batteries for smartphones, electric ...
July 8, 2026 Water’s odd behavior becomes even more dramatic when it is supercooled, but scientists have struggled to compare the many different ways of describing its microscopic structure. Researchers at the University of Osaka used an AI model trained on ...
July 7, 2026 A newly developed material can control and "program" heat, allowing it to direct thermal radiation, switch modes, and remember its settings without continuous power. The innovation could lead to smarter infrared sensors, better energy technologies, ...
July 7, 2026 Scientists have taken an important step toward building quantum detectors that could reveal some of the universe’s biggest secrets. Using a prototype device with two clouds of ultracold atoms, ...
July 7, 2026 Scientists have combined machine learning with quantum physics to discover two new superconductors and create a much faster way to search for many more. The technique could bring researchers significantly closer to the long-sought goal of a ...
July 5, 2026 Quantum mechanics has journeyed from a strange and controversial idea to the foundation of some of humanity’s most advanced technologies. Now researchers are pushing its boundaries even further, with potential breakthroughs in energy, medicine, ...
July 3, 2026 Scientists have uncovered new evidence that fireworks can pollute both the air and water in ways that extend beyond the visible smoke. The findings show that leftover debris, fine particles, and airborne chemicals may affect ecosystems and increase ...
July 3, 2026 Researchers have created quantum control techniques that can make a system appear to run backward in time. By precisely managing quantum measurements, they can reshape the system's arrow of time and even harvest energy from the measurement process ...
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July 13, 2026 Scientists have developed a new framework that could finally apply the laws of thermodynamics to real, ever-changing black holes instead of only perfectly stable ones. The advance may improve our ...
July 13, 2026 Physicists from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) have examined a fundamental property of quantum mechanics in collaboration with the German Aerospace Center (DLR). In the scientific ...
July 11, 2026 Gold may have a secret self-defense system that helps it resist tarnishing. Researchers discovered that atoms on gold surfaces reorganize themselves into patterns that block oxygen from reacting with ...
July 9, 2026 Scientists have rewritten the story of gallium after discovering that its unusual atomic bonds re-form at high temperatures, contradicting decades of accepted theory. The finding changes how ...
July 8, 2026 A new quantum theory bridges two rival models of how impurities behave inside many-particle systems, resolving a problem that has challenged physicists for decades. The findings could reshape ...
July 7, 2026 A centimeter-sized crystal has revealed clear signs of quantum entanglement, showing that large, everyday objects can display surprisingly deep ...
July 7, 2026 What if one of the biggest assumptions in cosmology is wrong? New research suggests the universe may not be perfectly uniform in every direction, as scientists have long believed. A puzzling mismatch ...
July 6, 2026 Engineers at a deep underground research facility noticed something strange during major rainstorms: airflow underground sometimes reversed direction. Using new sensors and mathematical modeling, ...
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