Hand clapping is ubiquitous behavior for humans across time and cultures, serving many different purposes: to signify approval with applause, for instance, or to keep time to music. Acousticians often ...

Scientists have finally unravelled the complex process that generates sound during handclaps, a discovery that shows how even simple acts can be rich with physics. The key to generating sound from ...

A physicist crunched the numbers on billions clapping at once—and found the "unity" moment barely makes a sound.

In a scene toward the end of the 2006 film, "X-Men: The Last Stand," a character claps and sends a shock wave that knocks out an opposing army. Sunny Jung, professor of biological and environmental ...

An international study led by Monash University in Australia found that wild gray seals clap underwater to communicate. A video posted to YouTube last month shows the mammals swimming and moving their ...

Unprecedented video shows a male gray seal using its flippers to produce a loud sound underwater. Scientists say it could be a previously undocumented form of communication, in which the seals are ...

The northern lights of Earth are more than just dazzling light shows — they also generate their own strange applause too, a new study reveals. The same energetic particles that create the dancing, ...

Have you ever clapped your hands to get someone’s attention? The resulting “crack!” sound is hard to ignore, rising above and penetrating through any background noise. Now imagine trying to do it ...

Marine mammals like whales and seals usually communicate vocally using calls and whistles. But now a Monash University-led international study has discovered that wild grey seals can also clap their ...

Spoiler: It’s very loud. By Sabrina Imbler Starting in the late 2000s, Colleen Reichmuth and Ole Larsen made a number of visits to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo, Calif., to hear a walrus make ...