Atoms slip against one another, eventually sticking in various combinations. Tectonic plates do the same, sliding across each other until they stick in a stationary state. Everything from the tiniest ...

MADISON — To understand friction on a very small scale, a team of University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers had to think big. Friction is a force that affects any application where moving parts come ...

The machine doesn’t care what it’s making—only that it’s making it fast. Frictionless systems optimize output. But meaning, memory, and margin live in the mess it leaves behind. The great smoothing is ...

We’ve upgraded offices. We’ve upgraded technology. But have we upgraded the system that connects them? This is the question more leaders should be asking. Because despite all the investment in ...

The upper figure shows the viscoelastic toy model proposed here, characterized by only six independent parameters. Surprisingly, this simple mechanical model produces complicated system dynamics, as ...