Protons are tiny particles just a femtometer across, but without them, atoms wouldn't exist. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Three William & Mary nuclear physicists are part of a team of scientists probing the strongest force in the universe, using a novel method of accessing the space between protons and neutrons in dense ...

Intriguingly, these scientists noticed that very particular numbers of protons and neutrons appeared to result in unusually stable nuclei, and these values became known as magic numbers. "The magic ...