I f you’ve ever watched a basketball game, you’re familiar with the white noise of staccato squeaks from the players’ shoes ...

The physics behind shoe squeaks is surprisingly complex. Phil Roeder via Wikimedia Commons under CC BY 2.0. As illustrated by the High School Musical song “Get’cha Head in the ...

Squeaky shoes are part of the symphony of a basketball game, when rubber soles rasp against the hardwood floors as players jab step, cut and pivot and defenders move their feet to stay in front of ...

A new study explains why basketball shoes make a high-pitched squeaking noise when they rub against the hardwood. The ridges on the sole hold the key ...

Tiny, repeating detachments between sole and floor — thousands of times a second — create the distinctive squeak heard on the ...

The authors also found that if a soft surface is smooth, the pulses are irregular and produce no sharp sounds, whereas ridged ...

The forces that cause sneakers to squeak also create mini-earthquakes (shoe-quakes, if you will) and tiny lightning bolts.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association’s March Madness is right around the corner. The National Basketball Association (NBA) is fresh off its All-Star break, with the playoffs on the horizon.

“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), ...

The unofficial soundtrack of every basketball, squash or hard-court tennis match is the constant high-pitched squeak or shriek of the players' shoes. But can this squeak be designed out of them while ...

On the court, the squeak of basketball shoes is hard to miss. Now, scientists have uncovered why they make that unmistakable ...