Basketball shoes on a gym floor, bicycle brakes in need of a tune-up, or the squeal of tires are everyday examples of squeaking sounds. Such sounds have long been attributed to stick-slip friction, or ...

A new, noninvasive and low-cost method for the early detection and monitoring of osteoarthritis (arthritis caused by wear and tear) may be on its way, thanks to research by UC Santa Barbara scientists ...

Researchers have uncovered key features of the dynamics of "stick-slip," a form of jerky motion responsible for squeaks and squeals in phenomena from door hinges to shifting tectonic plates. In this ...

“This project started with a simple question: why do basketball shoes squeak?” Adel Djellouli, a study co-author and materials scientist at Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), ...

Nanomachines will depend on our knowledge of friction, heat transfer and energy dissipation at the atomic level for their very survival. In the scramble to revolutionize the world with nanotechnology ...

We’ve all had the experience of that uncomfortably sticky feeling of syrup or jam residue on the breakfast table. Or a wad of chewing gum binding our shoe to the sidewalk. But what’s the science ...