The American Physical Society (APS) is pleased to announce that it will begin sponsoring Astrobites, a daily astrophysical literature journal written by graduate students in astronomy. This mutually beneficial collaboration aims to enhance the dissemination of research, educational resources, and career insights in the field of astronomy and astrophysics.

A new Collection by the Physical Review journals celebrates the 50th anniversary of the discovery of asymptotic freedom in quantum chromodynamics (QCD)—the theoretical basis for the strong force of nature that binds quarks and gluons into hadrons.

To mark the 243rd American Astronomical Society meeting, Physical Review Letters, Physical Review C, and Physical Review D highlighted several significant papers in astrophysics to illustrate the type of research these journals seek to publish.

With the goal of broadening its coverage of astrophysics, PRD hired astrophysicist Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz as an Associate Editor and appointed three experts in astrophysics to its Editorial Board.

Scientists have found seven astrophysical tau neutrinos—particles that are notoriously difficult to detect—in an analysis of data from the IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica.

Feature on:
R. Abbasi et al. (IceCube Collaboration)
Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 151001 (2024)

The authors compute the leading color contribution to the third-order QCD correction to the top quark decay width analytically. They additionally obtain the leading color third-order QCD correction to the inclusive semileptonic $b\to u$ decay.

A new model describes the population of black hole binaries without assumptions on the shape of their distribution—a capability that could boost the discovery potential of gravitational-wave observations.

Viewpoint on:
Thomas A. Callister and Will M. Farr
Phys. Rev. X 14, 021005 (2024)

The authors compute the semileptonic form factors for $B\to D^{*}$ decay in lattice QCD with a sophisticated chiral fermion formulation. They control all systematic errors. They use their result to obtain a standard model prediction for the decay ratio $R(D^{*})$ that is consistent with previous lattice QCD results.

Gravitational waves from merging Galactic binary stars will be a major source population detected by the future LASER Interferometry Space Antenna (LISA) mission. The authors demonstrate that, to establish population statistics and obtain insight into the nature and origin of magnetic fields, it is imperative that LISA data analysis properly model magnetism and eccentricity in these systems.

David Kaplan has developed a lattice model for particles that are left- or right-handed, offering a firmer foundation for the theory of weak interactions.

Feature on:
David B. Kaplan
Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 141603 (2024)

David B. Kaplan and Srimoyee Sen
Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 141604 (2024)

APS has selected 156 Outstanding Referees for 2024 who have demonstrated exceptional work in the assessment of manuscripts published in the Physical Review journals. A full list of the Outstanding Referees is available online.

From nature’s tiniest particles to waves that traverse the Universe—physicists remember resounding finds from the last half-century.

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