The writer Malcolm Gladwell popularized the term "tipping points" to refer to the moment when a trend or social behavior crosses a threshold and rapidly spreads everywhere. In physics, tipping points ...

Kareem El-Badry, associate professor of astronomy at Caltech, has been selected as one of 20 Packard Fellows for 2026. The Packard Fellowships for Science and Engineering provide just under $990,000 ...

When Alex Blum was growing up in the Black Forest region of Germany, he was consumed by what some might consider an unusual pastime: reading fantasy books and trying to reconstruct the implicit ...

First light is the threshold moment in astronomy when a telescope makes its first observation and opens a new window to discovery. That same spirit of possibility defines the Caltech community.

Caltech professors Marco Bernardi, Sujit Datta, and John Sader have been named fellows of the American Physical Society (APS) for their outstanding contributions to physics. Marco Bernardi, professor ...

Caltech students come from all over the world, bringing diverse experiences, perspectives, and passions. They share an unbridled sense of curiosity and an extraordinary aptitude for science, ...

The menu pane works like a drawer that slides in from the left side of the page. To close or open the menu, click or tap on the arrows. To move the map view, click and hold your mouse, then drag the ...

On March 8, Caltech released its final round of undergraduate admissions decisions, offering admission to a total of 427 exceptional students. Hailing from 41 U.S. states and territories and 27 ...

In 2015, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory, or LIGO, made history when it made the first direct detection of gravitational waves, or ripples in space and time, produced by a pair ...

Bacteria are remarkably good swimmers—a trait that can be detrimental to human health. One of the most common bacterial infections in a healthcare setting comes from bacteria entering the body through ...

Ringed by mountains and capped by a temperature inversion that traps bad air, Los Angeles has had bouts of smog since the turn of the 20th century. An outbreak in 1903 rendered the skies so dark that ...

The human brain has 100 billion neurons, making 100 trillion connections. Understanding the precise circuits of brain cells that orchestrate all of our day-to-day behaviors—such as moving our limbs, ...