Even on a black hole’s turf, an essential constant of nature holds steady. According to standard physics, the fine-structure constant, which governs interactions of electrically charged particles, is ...

In physics, the Fine Structure Constant is one the strangest numbers. The Fine Structure Constant is one the strangest numbers in all of physics. It’s the job of physicists to worry about numbers, but ...

One of the most exciting prospects in physics has been discovering that fundamental constants are not actually constant at all. When I first started writing, physicists and astronomers were just ...

A team in Paris has made the most precise measurement yet of the fine-structure constant, killing hopes for a new force of nature. As fundamental constants go, the speed of light, c, enjoys all the ...