Water waves can gain energy when they scatter from a whirlpool-like vortex. That is the conclusion of physicists in Brazil, Canada and the UK, who are the first to observe a phenomenon called ...

When bacteria band together, they can turn a fairly tame drop of water into a swirling vortex. The swirl is spun up by the bacteria’s tail-like flagella and the basic physics of how fluids flow, ...

Did you know that ocean waves that come across a current from a different direction can turn into a violent, rapidly swirling tornado-like whirlpool? This can also happen if a current flows over an ...

You walk into an empty room by the sea, to find a perfectly circular hole punched out of the concrete floor where a vortex of water swirls and crashes with perfect rhythm. It sounds like an optical ...

A vortex is a physics phenomenon that occurs when a gas or a liquid moves in circles. At the center is a vortex line that the matter swirls around. They are formed when there is a difference in the ...

Short pulses from a laser can be twisted into a series of doughnut-like vortices, offering a way to transmit more information using light. We usually encounter vortices in water and air, but similar ...