John Wojcik pays tribute to a black US activist who spent six decades at the forefront of struggles for voting rights, economic justice and peace – reshaping US politics and inspiring movements worldwide
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2D or Not 2D: Crystals that open up New Dimensions
Scientists invent a deceptively simple way to build a helter-skelter of atoms
These microscopic butterflies are one of the smallest, lightest and most expensive ones in the world as they partially consist of the novel one atom thick material graphene
[Maido Merisalu/Creative Commons]
In the fifth and final part of a series of articles, Storming the Heavens author JENNY CLEGG explains how the Communist Party of China’s approach demonstrates how Marxism, rooted in concrete conditions and mass participation, can shape history
In times of genocide, art is not a refuge from politics but a weapon against injustice, says ROGER McKENZIE, highlighting three of his own favourite political truth-tellers
As members elect their first leadership, a deeper battle is unfolding over what democracy should mean in practice, says CASSI BELLINGHAM
The language of humiliation is a step towards a second civil war, argues RAMZY BAROUD
ANDREW MURRAY says switching the prime minister on and off again is no substitute for new political approach we need
EVERYTHING is made of atoms. To understand this, we’re asked to imagine that the smooth continuous materials around us are each made up of tiny lumps.
Rather than acting like little inert building bricks, each is humming with the energy of existing. Every atom is itself an immense void with even tinier positive and negative charged matter suspended in space, whizzing round each other and changing configuration to give the atom its own particular properties.
The dynamism of the charges moving around and interacting both inside the atom and outside of it defines the ways that charge and energy can move between them, through space, sometimes joining them together in configurations of molecules of infinite variety.
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