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Quantum magic resources, or nonstabilizerness, are a central ingredient for universal quantum computation. In noisy many-body systems, the interplay between these resources and errors leads to sharp magic phase transitions. However, the…
Problems involving rotating systems analyzed from an inertial frame, without invoking fictitious forces, is something that freshman students find difficult to understand in an introductory mechanics course. One of the problems that I…
In order to better understand a complex theory like quantum mechanics, it is sometimes useful to take a step back and create alternative theories, with more intuitive foundations, and examine which features of quantum mechanics can be…
The motion of a ruck in a rug is used as an analogy to explain the role of dislocations in the deformation of crystalline solids. We take the analogy literally and study the shape and motion of a bump, wrinkle or ruck in a thin sheet in…
Acoustic invisibility of a cloaking system in turbulent uids has been poorly understood. Here we show that evident scattering would appear in turbulent wakes owing to the submergence of a classical cloaking device. The inherent mechanism is…
The `Black Thursday' crisis in cryptocurrency markets demonstrated deleveraging risks in over-collateralized non-custodial stablecoins. We develop a stochastic model that helps explain deleveraging crises in these over-collateralized…
The motion of an object within a viscous fluid and in the vicinity of a soft surface induces a hydrodynamic stress field that deforms the latter, thus modifying the boundary conditions of the flow. This results in elastohydrodynamic (EHD)…
When a coin falls in water, its trajectory is one of four types determined by its dimensionless moment of inertia $I^\ast$ and Reynolds number Re: (A) steady; (B) fluttering; (C) chaotic; or (D) tumbling. The dynamics induced by the…
It is well-known that there exist bar-joint frameworks (without continuous flexions) whose physical models can snap between different realizations due to non-destructive elastic deformations of material. We present a method to measure these…
Inspired by the turf-ball interaction in golf, this paper seeks to understand the bounce of a ball that can be modelled as a rigid sphere and the surface as supplying an elasto-plastic contact force in addition to Coulomb friction. A…
Some members of the vegetal kingdom can achieve surprisingly fast movements making use of a clever combination of evaporation, elasticity and cavitation. In this process, enthalpic energy is transformed into elastic energy and suddenly…
The notched stick, also known as the Gee-Haw-Whammy-Diddle, is a wooden toy able to convert linear vibration into rotational motion, whose behavior has been intriguing both children and physicists for decades. Here we derive an analytical…
We study the indentation of ultrathin elastic sheets clamped to the edge of a circular hole. This classical setup has received considerable attention lately, being used by various experimental groups as a probe to measure the surface…
A new type of knot energy is presented via real life experiments involving a thin resilient metallic tube. Knotted in different ways, the device mechanically acquires a uniquely determined (up to isometry) normal form at least when the…
The classical theory of rubber elasticity fails in the regime of large deformation. The un- derlying physical mechanism has been under debate for long time. In this work, we test the recently proposed mechanism of thermal elastic…
Residual stresses may appear in elastic bodies due to the formation of misfits in the micro-structure, driven by plastic deformations, thermal or growth processes. They are especially widespread in living matter, resulting from the dynamic…
Inspired by recent experiments demonstrating that vibrating elastic sheets can function as seemingly contactless suction cups, we investigate the elastohydrodynamic hovering of a thin elastic sheet vibrating near a rigid substrate. Previous…
This is an invited article for the Discussion and Debate special issue of The European Physical Journal Special Topics on the subject "Can Economics Be a Physical Science?" The first part of the paper traces the personal path of the author…
Nematic elastomers are rubbery solids which have liquid crystals incorporated into their polymer chains. These materials display many unusual mechanical properties, one such being the ability to form fine-scale microstructure. In this work,…
We develop a simple 1D model for the scattering of an incoming particle hitting the surface of mica crystal, the transmission of energy through the crystal by a localized mode, and the ejection of atom(s) at the incident or distant face.…