College of Science Media Center  

Two LSU-led research teams have been selected for the U.S. Department of Energy's Genesis Mission, a national initiative using artificial intelligence to accelerate scientific discovery. Partnering with Oak Ridge and Brookhaven national laboratories, LSU researchers will develop AI tools to advance nuclear physics and improve particle accelerator performance, including at Louisiana Light Source, strengthening U.S. research infrastructure, energy innovation, and national security.

LSU physicists have developed the first room-temperature quantum material capable of distinguishing and transporting different quantum states of light. Published in Nature, the breakthrough establishes a blueprint for engineering future quantum materials that could advance quantum computing, secure communications, sensing technologies, and renewable energy.

A newly released image from ESA's Euclid mission provides the most detailed visible-light view of the Milky Way's center ever captured. LSU researchers Matthew Penny and Himanshu Verma are helping use the data to support NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, improving astronomers' ability to detect, confirm, and measure the masses of exoplanets through gravitational microlensing.

LSU physicist Constantin Schrade and collaborator Mathias S. Scheurer have developed a new theory for controlling how electrons move through altermagnets, an emerging class of magnetic materials. Their work shows that changing the material’s microscopic magnetic patterns could steer electrons in different directions depending on their spin. The findings give scientists new predictions to test and could eventually help researchers control how spin-based information moves through future electronic technologies.

LSU researchers have created a cross-species single-cell atlas of plant roots, offering a new look at how plants respond and adapt to salt stress. By analyzing more than 200,000 individual root cells across five species, the team found that different cell types play distinct roles in stress response and that salt-tolerant plants have evolved multiple strategies for surviving saline environments. Published in Nature Communications, the study provides new insights into plant resilience that could help guide future efforts to develop crops better suited for increasingly stressful growing conditions.

LSU physicist Justin Wilson and collaborators have developed a new framework for controlling quantum chaos, adapting techniques originally designed for classical chaotic systems. The team showed that small, occasional corrections can stabilize unstable quantum states despite the constant fluctuations imposed by the uncertainty principle. Their work also revealed a sharp transition between controllable and uncontrollable behavior, uncovering universal rules that could help scientists protect and manipulate quantum information in future technologies.

As NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope prepares for launch Aug. 30, LSU scientists are ready to turn years of preparation into discovery. LSU astronomer Matthew Penny helped shape Roman’s science goals and a major survey that will search for new worlds near the center of the Milky Way. With four LSU-led projects receiving about $900,000 in funding, researchers will use Roman to study planets, stars, black holes and neutron stars—while connecting the mission to LSU’s astronomical legacy and training the next generation of researchers.

LSU herpetologist Chris Austin and collaborators have identified a new snake species from New Guinea, Lielaphis slashi, named for Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash. Austin first encountered the nonvenomous groundsnake during a 2006 expedition, but it took nearly two decades of genetic and physical analysis to confirm it as a species new to science. The discovery adds to Austin’s more than three decades of fieldwork documenting New Guinea’s biodiversity and his career total of 53 newly described species.

Scientists have found the strongest evidence yet for vacuum birefringence, a key prediction of quantum electrodynamics (QED), using NASA's Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) to study the magnetar 1E 1547.0−5408. The research, published in Nature, shows that the magnetar's powerful magnetic field changes how light travels through the vacuum of space. The discovery demonstrates how extreme cosmic environments can serve as natural laboratories for testing the fundamental laws of physics.