Ugh, those cups. Several months ago, Diedre Neal, the sixth-grade assistant principal at Alice Deal Middle School, started noticing them all over the cafeteria. During lunch, the children — notably ...

Researchers deserve a round of applause for uncovering the science behind the acoustics produced from hand clapping that had not been clearly understood until recently. The daily gesture that people ...

Want to stay current with Arthur’s writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. What is the sound of one hand clapping? You may have encountered this cryptic question at some ...

It might be hard to imagine yourself in ancient Rome, but if you were dropped into the audience of a play 2000 years ago, you’d probably know what to do when it finished – start clapping. Making a ...

WHEN I WAS GROWING UP, I ENVIED SALLY CULVER. Though she was five years younger, she had somehow managed to get herself a fan club. It began one summer evening, when Mrs. Culver brought her 1 year-old ...

Researchers elucidate the complex physical mechanisms and fluid dynamics involved in a handclap, with potential applications in bioacoustics and personal identification, whereby a handclap could be ...

A round of applause, please: Scientists have finally figured out what’s behind the sound of clapping. The research pinpoints a mechanism called a Helmholtz resonator — the same acoustic concept that ...