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Archive for the ‘cosmology’ category: Page 91

Oct 11, 2023

The Cosmic Tapestry: Universal Consciousness and the Big Bang

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics, robotics/AI

From the vast expanse of galaxies that paint our night skies to the intricate neural networks within our brains, everything we know and see can trace its origins back to a singular moment: the Big Bang. It’s a concept that has not only reshaped our understanding of the universe but also offers profound insights into the interconnectedness of all existence.

Imagine, if you will, the entire universe compressed into an infinitesimally small point. This is not a realm of science fiction but the reality of our cosmic beginnings. Around 13.8 billion years ago, a singular explosion gave birth to time, space, matter, and energy. And in that magnificent burst of creation, the seeds for everything — galaxies, stars, planets, and even us — were sown.

But what if the Big Bang was not just a physical event? What if it also marked the birth of a universal consciousness? A consciousness that binds every particle, every star, and every living being in a cosmic tapestry of shared experience and memory.

Oct 11, 2023

ATLAS sets stringent limits on the existence of supersymmetric dark matter particles

Posted by in categories: cosmology, information science, particle physics, robotics/AI

If new particles are out there, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the ideal place to search for them. The theory of supersymmetry suggests that a whole new family of partner particles exists for each of the known fundamental particles. While this might seem extravagant, these partner particles could address various shortcomings in current scientific knowledge, such as the source of the mysterious dark matter in the universe, the “unnaturally” small mass of the Higgs boson, the anomalous way that the muon spins and even the relationship between the various forces of nature. But if these supersymmetric particles exist, where might they be hiding?

This is what physicists at the LHC have been trying to find out, and in a recent study of proton–proton data from Run 2 of the LHC (2015–2018), the ATLAS collaboration provides the most comprehensive overview yet of its searches for some of the most elusive types of supersymmetric particles—those that would only rarely be produced through the “weak” nuclear force or the electromagnetic force. The lightest of these weakly interacting supersymmetric particles could be the source of dark matter.

The increased collision energy and the higher collision rate provided by Run 2, as well as new search algorithms and machine-learning techniques, have allowed for deeper exploration into this difficult-to-reach territory of supersymmetry.

Oct 10, 2023

“Modified gravity” could rule out both dark matter and Planet Nine

Posted by in category: cosmology

Our solar system officially houses eight planets, but some scientists say there could be a ninth. And that’s not just Pluto aficionados – evidence suggests a huge undiscovered world lurks on the dark fringes out there. Now, a new study has found the outer solar system oddities could be explained by modified theories of gravity, an alternative idea to dark matter.

In the 19th century, astronomers measuring the orbit of Uranus noticed some inconsistencies between observations and predictions, and concluded that it was being influenced by the gravity of a large unseen body. Sure enough, the planet Neptune was soon discovered as a result.

In 2016 astronomers made a similar prediction: based on the bizarre orbital patterns of six icy objects in the Kuiper belt, an unknown planet with the mass of about 10 Earths could be tugging on them from the shadows. Further evidence from other objects and even the Sun’s tilt seemed to strengthen the case.

Oct 9, 2023

NASA telescope photographs supermassive black hole surrounded by ring of stars

Posted by in category: cosmology

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has snapped a new photograph of a spiral galaxy located 78 million light-years away, originally discovered in 1877.

Oct 9, 2023

New Way for a Black Hole to be a Messy Eater

Posted by in category: cosmology

Simulations indicate an erratic and copious accretion of gas onto a black hole when the surrounding disk is tilted and the black hole spins rapidly.

Oct 8, 2023

Weird dark matter waves seem to warp the light from distant galaxies

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics

Ultralight dark matter particles that behave like waves, called axions, seem to be a better match for gravitational lensing measurements than more traditional explanations for dark matter.

By Leah Crane

Oct 8, 2023

Scientists untangle mystery about the universe’s earliest galaxies

Posted by in categories: computing, cosmology

WASHINGTON, Oct 6 (Reuters) — Since beginning operations last year, the James Webb Space Telescope has provided an astonishing glimpse of the early history of our universe, spotting a collection of galaxies dating to the enigmatic epoch called cosmic dawn.

But the existence of what appear to be massive and mature galaxies during the universe’s infancy defied expectations — too big and too soon. That left scientists scrambling for an explanation while questioning the basic tenets of cosmology, the science of the origin and development of the universe. A new study may resolve the mystery without ripping up the textbooks.

The researchers used sophisticated computer simulations to model how the earliest galaxies evolved. These indicated that star formation unfolded differently in these galaxies in the first few hundred million years after the Big Bang event 13.8 billion years ago that initiated the universe than it does in large galaxies like our Milky Way populating the cosmos today.

Oct 7, 2023

Saturday Citations: Hippo maxillofacial issues; implicit biases in the game of kings; AI masters Street Fighter

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics, robotics/AI

They announced the Nobel prizes this week! But did any of the recipients teach an AI to play Street Fighter? Here are a few of this week’s stories not yet lauded by international committees of scientists, but which we thought were pretty good:

Even if you think a galaxy is old enough to drink, you should probably go ahead and ask for ID before you serve them. The earliest galaxies in the universe captured by the James Webb Space Telescope appeared too bright, massive and way too old to have formed that soon after the Big Bang, presenting a problem for astronomers and their favorite model, the standard model of cosmology.

Recently, a team of physicists at Northwestern University used computer simulations to model galaxy formation after the Big Bang and demonstrate that (at least in the model universe) stars formed in bursts, producing light of enormously greater intensity than a modern galaxy like, say, Andromeda, where is steady and the number of stars gradually increases over time.

Oct 7, 2023

Pulsars may make dark matter glow

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics

The central question in the ongoing hunt for dark matter is: what is it made of? One possible answer is that dark matter consists of particles known as axions. A team of astrophysicists, led by researchers from the universities of Amsterdam and Princeton, has now shown that if dark matter consists of axions, it may reveal itself in the form of a subtle additional glow coming from pulsating stars. Their work is published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Dark matter may be the most sought-for constituent of our universe. Surprisingly, this mysterious form of matter, that physicist and astronomers so far have not been able to detect, is assumed to make up an enormous part of what is out there.

No less than 85% of matter in the universe is suspected to be “dark,” presently only noticeable through the gravitational pull it exerts on other astronomical objects. Understandably, scientists want more. They want to really see dark matter—or at the very least, detect its presence directly, not just infer it from gravitational effects. And, of course: they want to know what it is.

Oct 6, 2023

QBism and the philosophical crisis of quantum mechanics

Posted by in categories: computing, cosmology, quantum physics

The famous Copenhagen Interpretation favored by the founders of quantum mechanics is most definitely psi-epistemic. Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, and others saw the state vector as being related to our interactions with the Universe. As Bohr said, “Physics is not about how the world is; it is about what we can say about the world.”

QBism is also definitively psi-epistemic, but it is not the Copenhagen Interpretation. Its epistemic focus grew organically from its founders’ work in quantum information science, which is arguably the most important development in quantum studies over the last 30 years. As physicists began thinking about quantum computers, they recognized that seeing the quantum in terms of information — an idea with strong epistemic grounding — provided new and powerful insights. By taking the information perspective seriously and asking, “Whose information?” the founders of QBism began a fundamentally new line of inquiry that, in the end, doesn’t require science fiction ideas like infinite parallel universes. That to me is one of its great strengths.

But, like all quantum interpretations, there is a price to be paid by QBism for its psi-epistemic perspective. The perfectly accessible, perfectly knowable Universe of classical physics is gone forever, no matter what interpretation you choose. We’ll dive into the price of QBism next time.

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