What is Nuclear Physics?

The Sun, imaged by the Solar Dynamics Observatory
(Credit: Courtesy of NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams)

Life, the Universe and everything!

Everything we can see in the night time sky is made of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics describes how the Sun generates the energy we need for life on Earth, how all the atoms in your body were made in stars and what happens in stars when they die. Nuclear physics research tries to answer the fundamental questions:

Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

So what exactly is nuclear physics…?

• Atoms, Nuclei, Elements and Isotopes


• Radioactivity


• Nuclear Astrophysics


• Nuclear Applications
   

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