Over the past several decades, dozens of tests have sought the 132 Lorentz-violating degrees of freedom in the nonrelativistic limit of the minimal matter sector of the standard-model extension, yet 43 remained unconstrained. In this Letter, we limit all previously unconstrained degrees of freedom and make improvements on 13 prior limits. The approach introduced here offers the potential of further improvements for 49 degrees of freedom in suitable future experiments, along with additional discovery potential offered by combining data from experiments performed in different locations.

A central question in strong-interaction physics, governed by quantum chromodynamics (QCD), is whether femtoscale droplets of quark-gluon plasma form in small collision systems involving projectiles significantly smaller than heavy ions. Collisions of light ions such as ${}^{16}\mathrm{O}$ and ${}^{20}\mathrm{Ne}$ offer a unique opportunity to probe the emergence of collective behavior in QCD matter. This Letter presents the first measurements of the elliptic ($v_2$) and triangular ($v_3$) flow of charged particles in ${}^{16}\mathrm{O}–{}^{16}\mathrm{O}$ and ${}^{20}\mathrm{Ne}–{}^{20}\mathrm{Ne}$ collisions at a center-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=5.36\mathrm{TeV}$ with the ALICE detector. The hydrodynamic model predictions, explicitly incorporating the nuclear structures of ${}^{16}\mathrm{O}$ and ${}^{20}\mathrm{Ne}$, exhibit a good agreement with the flow measurements presented. The observed increase of $v_2$ in central Ne–Ne collisions relative to OO collisions, driven by the nuclear geometries, highlights the importance of utilizing light nuclei with well-defined geometric shapes to constrain the initial conditions. These findings support the presence of nuclear geometry-driven hydrodynamic flow in light-ion collisions at the LHC.

The long-range collective flow of particles produced in oxygen-oxygen ($\mathrm{O}+\mathrm{O}$) and neon-neon ($\mathrm{Ne}+\mathrm{Ne}$) collisions is measured with the CMS detector at the CERN LHC. The data samples were collected at a center-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of 5.36 TeV, with integrated luminosities of $7{\mathrm{nb}}^{-1}$ and $0.8{\mathrm{nb}}^{-1}$ for $\mathrm{O}+\mathrm{O}$ and $\mathrm{Ne}+\mathrm{Ne}$ collisions, respectively. Two- and four-particle azimuthal correlations are measured over nearly five units of pseudorapidity. Significant elliptic ($v_2$) and triangular ($v_3$) flow harmonics are observed in both systems. The ratios of $v_n$ coefficients between $\mathrm{Ne}+\mathrm{Ne}$ and $\mathrm{O}+\mathrm{O}$ collisions suggest sensitivity to the intrinsic nuclear structure of the respective Ne and O ions. Hydrodynamic models with ab initio nuclear structure inputs qualitatively reproduce the collision-overlap dependence of both the $v_n$ values and the $\mathrm{Ne}+\mathrm{Ne}$ to $\mathrm{O}+\mathrm{O}$ ratios. These measurements provide new constraints when modeling the interplay of nuclear structure and collective dynamics in collisions of ${}^{16}\mathrm{O}$ and ${}^{20}\mathrm{Ne}$ ions, respectively.

The ground-state rotational band of ${}^{252}\mathrm{Fm}$ ($Z=100$, $N=152$) was investigated using two different experimental setups at the JAEA Tandem Accelerator Laboratory. The $2^{+}\to 0^{+}$ and $4^{+}\to 2^{+}$ transitions were observed in the $\alpha$ decay of ${}^{256}\mathrm{No}$ via $\alpha \text{−}\gamma$ coincidence spectroscopy. The energies of the $(6^{+})\to (4^{+})$, $(8^{+})\to (6^{+})$, and $(10^{+})\to (8^{+})$ transitions were identified in the prompt $\gamma$-ray spectrum of ${}^{252}\mathrm{Fm}$ produced in the ${}^{18}\mathrm{O}+{}^{249}\mathrm{Cf}$ multinucleon transfer reaction. The new data reveal that, compared with neighboring fermium isotopes and $N=152$ isotones in the region, ${}^{252}\mathrm{Fm}$ has the lowest first excited $2^{+}$-state energy, 41.88(16) keV, and the largest kinematic moment of inertia. These properties constitute new evidence for the deformed shell gaps at $Z=100$ and $N=152$, supporting the understanding of ${}^{252}\mathrm{Fm}$ as a deformed doubly magic nucleus.

The layered compound $\gamma \text{−}{\mathrm{PtBi}}_2$ is a topological semimetal with Fermi arcs at the surface joining bulk Weyl points. Recent work has found signatures of surface superconductivity consisting of gap openings compatible with a critical temperature orders of magnitude larger than the bulk value. However, no superconducting vortices have been identified, raising questions about the robustness of the phase coherence. Here, we use very low temperature STM and find robust superconductivity with ${\mathrm{T}}_C=2.9\mathrm{K}$ and ${\mathrm{H}}_{C2}\approx 1.8\mathrm{T}$ linked to the Fermi arcs. We observe quantized superconducting vortices and the Josephson effect, demonstrating two-dimensional macroscopic quantum phase coherence.

The vertical redistribution of materials in the lunar regolith—ranging from continuously produced space-weathering products to sporadic pulses of supernova- or kilonova-derived isotopes—remains a fundamental problem in planetary science. We present a unified stochastic model of regolith gardening induced by the impact flux. Treating gardening as a competition between impact-driven advection and diffusion predicts the maturity profiles of Apollo cores over more than 2 orders of magnitude in time ($1.4\times {10}^7$ to $4.5\times {10}^8\mathrm{yr}$). This model describes well the depth profiles of live ${}^{60}\mathrm{Fe}$ in Apollo regolith samples, suggesting that supernova dust capture is independent of native iron abundance, and is consistent with a uniform influx at the latitudes of the Apollo landing sites. We extend our model to predict lunar signals for live $r$-process species that might originate from supernovae or kilonovae: ${}^{244}\mathrm{Pu}$ tied to terrestrial detections, and ${}^{129}\mathrm{I}$, ${}^{182}\mathrm{Hf}$, and ${}^{247}\mathrm{Cm}$ based on $r$-process calculations. The ${}^{244}\mathrm{Pu}/{}^{60}\mathrm{Fe}$ depth profile can probe the origin of ${}^{244}\mathrm{Pu}$, motivating searches in Artemis regolith samples down to depths $\mathcal{O}(100)\mathrm{cm}$.

We prove the existence of spontaneous symmetry breaking in suitably low-energy eigenstates of certain gapless and frustrated many-body quantum systems, namely symmetric quantum perturbations to classical models that exhibit spontaneous symmetry breaking of a finite group at some positive temperature. Additionally, the classical model need not be local in space, as long as it satisfies a quantum analog of the Peierls condition. As an example of our technique, we establish robust ferromagnetism in random-bond Ising models in $d=2$ dimensions with sufficiently biased random couplings, with weak transverse field. Our mathematical technique is based on establishing quantum bottlenecks, similar to a “many-body Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin” method for evaluating tunneling rates. Using these same methods, we provide new proofs of metastability and the slow decay of the false vacuum, applicable to gapless metastable states. Our Letter represents a first step toward a rigorous classification of stable gapless quantum phases.

We present a high-precision calculation of the hadronic running of electroweak gauge couplings from first principles. Employing lattice QCD in the low-energy regime, we achieve permille precision for virtualities $Q^2\lesssim 12{\mathrm{GeV}}^2$. At $Q^2\simeq 1{\mathrm{GeV}}^2$, our determination deviates by up to $7\sigma$ from estimates based on $e^{+}{e}^{-}$ measurements. Combining lattice QCD with perturbative QCD via the Euclidean split technique, we obtain for the electromagnetic coupling $\mathrm{\Delta }{\alpha }_{\mathrm{had}}^{(5)}(M_Z^2)=0.027821(34{)}_{\mathrm{lat}}(35{)}_{\text{pQCD}}$, which is more than twice as precise as recent phenomenological determinations. We assess improvement scenarios by which the precision target for next-generation electroweak measurements could be reached.

Energetic quarks and gluons traversing a hot and dense quark-gluon plasma deposit energy and momentum into the medium before hadronizing to collimated sprays of particles, known as jets. This energy-momentum deposition is expected to produce medium responses, collectively known as jet wakes, with “diffusion wake” denoting a depletion of particles in the direction opposite to the propagating jet. The diffusion wake is studied by comparing dijet-hadron correlations measured in lead-lead (PbPb) and proton-proton (pp) collisions. The analysis uses PbPb and pp data recorded at a nucleon-nucleon (NN) center-of-mass energy $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=5.02\mathrm{TeV}$ with the CMS detector at the CERN LHC. By exploring how the dijet-hadron correlation distributions differ for various pseudorapidity separations of the two jets in the dijet, the presence of a jet diffusion wake is firmly established. The diffusion wake signal has a significance greater than 5 standard deviations for charged particles in the transverse momentum range $1<p_{\mathrm{T}}<2\mathrm{GeV}$. The measurements are compared with model predictions with and without jet wake effects, providing new insights into quark-gluon plasma properties and the formation of jet-induced wakes.

Single photons are the flying qubits of choice for distributing entanglement in a quantum internet. Quantum memories embedded in quantum repeaters are crucial to overcome transmission loss and enhance the rate of quantum communication. A multimode memory can further boost the channel capacity. However, benchmarking and building a practical quantum memory that simultaneously optimizes multiple performance metrics poses two key challenges. Here, we introduce quantum interconnect rate to comprehensively quantify quantum memories, and further demonstrate a high-performance quantum memory that simultaneously integrates three essential criteria at once: large multimode capacity, high efficiency, and high fidelity. Operating on 11-dimensional spatial modes, our memory achieves a uniform efficiency exceeding 80% and qubit storage fidelities above 99%, enabling the efficient storage of high-dimensional qudits. Based on these capabilities, we estimate a distribution of $3.56\pm 0.16\mathrm{bits}$ of quantum information over a 1000-km repeater link in one minute, highlighting a practical pathway toward scalable quantum interconnects and quantum networks.

Long-distance matter-matter entanglement is pivotal for scalable quantum communication, distributed quantum computing, and sensing. In this Letter, we report entanglement between two atomic ensemble quantum memories over 420 km. We employ the Duan-Lukin-Cirac-Zoller (DLCZ) scheme for remote entanglement generation and convert photons emitted from the memories to telecom S band that enable us to harness ultralow transmission loss in fiber. We stabilize a photon’s relative phase between the two memories using full-time far-off-resonant locking to reduce high-frequency noise and intermittent dual-band locking to compensate low-frequency drift jointly. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the memory-memory entangling probability beats the repeaterless channel capacity for direct entanglement distribution. Our experiment provides a test bed of studying quantum network applications beyond metropolitan scale.

Twisted graphene provides a tunable platform for studying superconductivity in two dimensions. In the presence of electric currents and magnetic fields, vortices determine the phenomenological properties of the material. Here, we employ a gate-defined Josephson junction as a single-vortex sensor, enabling direct access to individual vortex dynamical events. Our measurements reveal that vortices enter the superconducting leads via classical thermal activation over energy barriers at elevated temperatures $T>100\mathrm{mK}$. At low temperatures $T<90\mathrm{mK}$, we observe macroscopic quantum tunneling through these barriers. The data are consistent with a sharp, first-order type quantum-to-classical transition. From our measurements, we extract vortex entry and exit energy barriers on the order of a few kelvins and estimate the barrier thickness to be approximately 100 nm.

The exceptional tunability of two-dimensional van der Waals materials offers unique opportunities for exploring novel superconducting phases. However, in such systems, the measurement of superfluid phase stiffness, a fundamental property of a superconductor, is challenging because of the mesoscopic sample size. Here, we introduce a contact-free technique for probing the electrodynamic response, and thereby the phase stiffness, of atomically thin superconductors using on-chip superconducting microwave resonators. We demonstrate this technique on $4\mathrm{Hb}\text{−}{\mathrm{TaS}}_2$, a van der Waals superconductor whose gap structure under broken mirror symmetry is under debate. In our cleanest few-layer device, we observe a superconducting critical temperature comparable to that of the bulk. The temperature evolution of the phase stiffness features nodeless behavior in the presence of broken mirror symmetry, inconsistent with the scenario of nodal surface superconductivity. With minimal fabrication requirements, our technique enables microwave measurements across wide ranges of two-dimensional superconductors.

Large twist angles in twisted bilayer graphene are widely expected to be electronically trivial, with negligible interlayer coupling and no electronic reconstruction, in contrast to the rich moiré-driven band reconstruction and correlated physics that emerge at small twist angles. Here, we show that this paradigm breaks down near a twist angle of 29°, where the system crosses over between quasicrystalline and commensurate order. Atomic-resolution transmission electron microscopy directly reveals the coexistence of near-dodecagonal quasicrystalline symmetry and emerging moiré periodicity, indicating an intermediate, nonperiodic structural regime. Magnetotransport measurements uncover strong interlayer hybridization mediated by Umklapp scattering, manifested by magneto-intersubband oscillations and a highly unconventional Landau-level spectrum. Remarkably, the Landau-level degeneracy evolves from 4- to 12-fold with increasing temperature, a behavior incompatible with two decoupled graphene monolayers. These findings establish large-angle twisted bilayer graphene as a platform where quasiperiodic symmetry fundamentally reshapes low-energy electronic states beyond the conventional moiré framework.

We obtain an exact analytic expression for the dynamical structure factor of one-dimensional quantum gas of hard rods. Our result is valid for an arbitrary many-body state of the system, with finite temperature states and the ground state being important special cases that we analyze in detail. We demonstrate that the expression obeys fundamental relations such like the $f$-sum rule and the detailed balance. We also reveal the hidden fermionic structure behind the correlator. In the static limit we show that it can be written in terms of universal functions, which, at zero temperature, coincide with the level spacing distribution function of the Gaussian unitary ensemble. Our Letter provides a full and exact characterization of a dynamic correlation function in a strongly correlated interacting quantum many-body system.

Axion quasiparticles introduce magnetoelectric coupling in topological materials, yet their optical signatures are intrinsically weak, severely limiting experimental detection and practical exploitation. Here, we demonstrate maximal optical chirality of axion quasiparticles by coupling them with degenerate quasibound states in the continuum (qBICs). By integrating three-dimensional topological insulators (3DTIs) with achiral photonic crystal slabs (PCSs), we reveal that axion quasiparticles induce an effective Zeeman effect that lifts the degeneracy of achiral qBICs in PCSs, splitting them into two nondegenerate high-$Q$ chiral qBICs with maximally opposite chirality. These result in a more than ${10}^3$- and 200-fold increase in the polarization conversion efficiency and Faraday rotation angle, respectively, compared to the intrinsic chiroptical response of bare 3DTI films. Moreover, circular dichroism and nonreciprocal optical responses are revealed as new key signatures for probing axion quasiparticles in 3DTI-PCS coupled systems. Our results provide a definitive route for observing axion quasiparticles and topological physics, while establishing a promising platform for controlling optical polarization, spin, phase, and nonreciprocal responses.

Rare events refer to qualitatively unlikely events whose realization can nevertheless have important consequences. Typically, the prediction of the kinetics of these events relies on Arrhenius laws, with exponentially distributed waiting times, and no correlations between successive occurrences. However, this description breaks down in the presence of long-term memory, as has been observed in the contexts of geophysical time series or protein dynamics. So far, existing analytical approaches do not quantify the correlations between rare events due to long-term memory. Here, for non-Markovian Gaussian processes, we determine analytically the impact of long-term memory on the distribution of first and second passage times to a rarely reached threshold, using a perturbation approach. This distribution is nonexponential, thus going beyond the Arrhenius paradigm. We obtain an explicit expression for the covariance between the first and second passage times, and we predict how the mean time to the next extreme event depends on the previous passage time, illustrating the phenomenon of clustering of extreme events. These analytical results, validated through extensive stochastic simulations, shed lights on the strong correlation between successive occurrences of extreme events due to long-term memory.

Quantum communication protocols seek to leverage the unique properties of quantum systems for coordination or communication tasks, usually with guarantees of security or anonymity that exceed what is possible classically. One promising domain of application is elections, where strong such guarantees are essential to ensure legitimacy. We experimentally implement a recently proposed election protocol from Centrone et al. [Quantum protocol for electronic voting without election authorities, Phys. Rev. Appl. 18, 014005 (2022)] designed such that no one, including a potential central authority, can know the preferred candidate of any voter other than themself. We conduct a four-party election, generating and distributing four-partite GHZ states with $\approx 89\%$ fidelity and successfully recording voters’ intentions $\approx 87\%$ of the time.

Quantum information protocols offer significant advantages in properties such as security, anonymity, and privacy for communication and computing tasks. An application in which guaranteeing the highest possible security and privacy is critical for democratic societies is electronic voting. As computational power continues to evolve, classical voting schemes may become increasingly vulnerable to information leakage. In this Letter, we present the experimental demonstration of an information-theoretically-secure and efficient electronic voting protocol that, crucially, does not rely on election authorities, leveraging the unique properties of quantum states. Our experiment is based on a high-performance source of Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) states and realizes a proof-of-principle implementation of the protocol in two scenarios: a configuration with four voters and two candidates employing privacy enhancement techniques and an election scenario supporting up to eight voters and 16 candidates. The latter is particularly well suited for secure board-level elections within organizations or small-scale governmental contexts.

A long-standing issue for fusion reactors based on 3D magnetic confinement (stellarators) has been finding suitable coils. Traditional optimization methods struggle to balance multiple physics and engineering constraints, requiring significant computing resources and input tuning, yet still resulting in suboptimal or infeasible configurations. We present a new optimization method based on an augmented Lagrangian scheme and show that it efficiently generates stellarator coils that exhibit enhanced physics performance and meet essential design requirements. This will accelerate progress toward commercially viable stellarator fusion reactors.