Vasudevan Mukunth

Vasudevan Mukunth is the science editor at The Wire.

The bright star on the left, Alpha Centauri, is in fact two stars close together: Alpha Centauri A and B. A much dimmer star, circled in red, is Proxima Centauri and is thought to be orbiting the A/B pair. The bright star on the right is Beta Centauri, considered to be a separate stellar system. Credit: Skatebiker/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0

Starshot, a Billionaire’s New Mission to Get to Alpha Centauri in 20 Years

Vasudevan Mukunth 13/04/2016

Yuri Milner announced a $100-million grant to find out...

A lionfish. Credit: benpopik/Flickr, CC BY 2.0

Making a Meal of Invasive Species Can Sometimes be a Prickly Issue

Vasudevan Mukunth 11/04/2016

Can humans solve the lionfish invasion problem by eating...

The Devasthal optical telescope's supporting structure, which also hosts three detectors, under a protective dome. Credit: IIST

‘World Class’ Optical Telescope, and India’s Largest, to Be Activated near Nainital

Vasudevan Mukunth 30/03/2016

The instrument is part of a widening foray into...

Simulation of a few-femtosecond electron bunch trapped in a laser-excited plasma wakefield. Caption & Source: DESY

First Demo that Some Future Particle Accelerators May Be 100x Smaller

Vasudevan Mukunth 24/03/2016

American physicists have validated the idea that two tabletop...

Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located just outside Batavia, Illinois. The larger ring houses the Tevatron, a particle accelerator that operated until 2011, when it was shut because its capabilities had been superseded by the LHC. Credit: pedrik/Flickr, CC BY 2.0

All You Need to Know to Get Started on Particle Physics

Vasudevan Mukunth 21/03/2016

Because of the scale at which its experiments are...

This image shows a collision event with a photon pair observed by the CMS detector in proton-collision data collected in 2015 with no magnetic field present. The energy deposits of the two photons are represented by the two large green towers. The mass of the di-photon system is between 700 and 800 GeV. The candidates are consistent with what is expected for prompt isolated photons. Caption & credit © 2016 CERN

Physicists Excited as Prospects for Suspected New Fundamental Particle Improve

Vasudevan Mukunth 19/03/2016

Although the data's statistical significance isn't as good as...

Andrew Wiles at a lecture in Boston, Massachusetts, 1995. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Andrew Wiles Wins 2016 Abel Prize for Proving Fermat’s Last Theorem

Vasudevan Mukunth 18/03/2016

The history and mathematical complexity of Fermat's Last Theorem...