The materials approach to quantum spacetime

量子时空的材料方法

• 批准号: MR/X034453/1
• 负责人: Tarek Anous
• 金额: $ 193.55万
• 依托单位: Queen Mary University of London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2024 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=MR%2FX034453%2F1
• 关键词: materials; approach; quantum; spacetime

The effects of gravity are known to all of us: responsible both for falling apples and planetary orbits, but it remains the least well-understood force in nature. An open question in our conceptualization of gravity regards whether information is destroyed in gravitational processes.Black holes, formed from the collapse of stars, are a beautiful testing ground for these ideas. Consider a diary, containing deeply personal secrets that must be kept from public view at all costs. Is it possible to destroy the information contained within by throwing the diary into a black hole? While this might seem useful in practice, the implications for fundamental physics would be disastrous. A self-consistent physical theory should not allow for information destruction, as this would imply a basic inability to predict the outcomes of experiments; negating the entire paradigm of the scientific method and the validity of hypothesis testing. Cue Hawking's information paradox, which definitively shows that, within the framework of Einstein's general relativity, black holes do indeed destroy information. This suggests that we must search for a theory that can replace Einstein's general relativity, while nevertheless reproducing all of its successful predictions in the realm of astronomy and cosmology. This is a daunting but necessary task.Black holes are not the only realm where Einstein's equations reveal inconsistencies: astronomical surveys suggest that our universe is expanding, and similarly to black holes, an expanding universe potentially destroys the information in the diary, if left alone for eons. If we are to understand the origins of our expanding universe, it is imperative that we build theoretical models that accurately describe expanding space without the problematic information loss.To get at the crux of the information paradox, I am looking at frameworks that could eventually replace general relativity. My approach is to treat the fabric of space as a `material' to be experimented on. Of course, being a theoretical physicist means that my experiments will be `thought-' or `gedanken-' experiments, but nonetheless Einstein's equations reveal that under certain conditions, or in the presence of certain types of matter, spacetime exhibits phase transitions, much like how water turns to gas if the temperature and pressure are tuned beyond specific values. My goal is to use such thought experiments to guide a search for new microscopic theories that will provide a better understanding of the fabric of the universe and its cosmic origins. These new theories will still describe the known features of gravity, but without the problematic information loss, and simultaneously have the potential to reveal new undiscovered properties of spacetime and our universe.

我们所有人都知道重力的影响：既负责苹果掉落和行星轨道，但它仍然是自然界中最不受欢迎的力量。我们对重力概念化的一个公开问题指出，是否在引力过程中破坏了信息。由恒星崩溃形成的黑洞是这些想法的美丽测试场。考虑一本日记，其中包含必须不惜一切代价从公众看来必须保留的深刻个人秘密。是否可以通过将日记扔进黑洞来破坏其中包含的信息？尽管这在实践中似乎有用，但对基本物理学的影响是灾难性的。自洽的物理理论不应允许信息破坏，因为这意味着基本的无法预测实验的结果。否定科学方法的整个范式和假设检验的有效性。 Cue Hawking的信息悖论明确地表明，在爱因斯坦的总体相对论的框架内，黑洞确实确实破坏了信息。这表明我们必须搜索可以取代爱因斯坦一般相对论的理论，同时又重现了其在天文学和宇宙学领域的所有成功预测。这是一项艰巨但必要的任务。黑色的洞不是唯一的爱因斯坦方程式揭示不一致之处的领域：天文学调查表明我们的宇宙正在扩大，并且与黑洞类似，与黑洞相似，一个不断扩展的宇宙可能会摧毁日记中的信息，如果留下了日记中的信息，那么对于eons。如果我们要了解扩展的宇宙的起源，那么我们必须构建理论模型，以准确地描述不存在问题的信息丢失而扩大空间。要获得信息悖论的关键，我正在研究最终可以替换的框架一般相对论。我的方法是将空间结构视为要进行实验的“材料”。当然，作为理论物理学家，我的实验将是“思想”或“ gedanken”实验，但是爱因斯坦的方程式表明，在某些条件下或某些类型的物质，时空表现出相位的过渡，很多就像如果温度和压力超出特定值，水如何转向气体。我的目标是使用这种思想实验来指导搜索新的微观理论，以更好地了解宇宙的结构及其宇宙起源。这些新理论仍将描述重力的已知特征，但没有问题的信息丢失，并且同时有可能揭示时空和我们宇宙的新未发现的特性。