Kaixuan Huang

In 1963, a Tanzanian schoolboy named Erasto Mpemba noticed that hot ice cream freezes faster than cold. That paradox, named after him, long remained a subject of debate in classical thermodynamics. Now the quantum world offers its own version: a state with more strongly broken symmetry can recover it faster than a less broken one.

A huge pool of clear liquid is hidden deep underground. Inside, there is nothing but a pristine 'broth' that flashes with faint light when an invisible particle flies through. This is the JUNO detector—20,000 tons of liquid scintillator built to hunt for neutrinos. The main enemy of such a hunt is not darkness but its own noise.