String theory – the other way of interpreting our universe

artistic interpretation of element string which may make up our universe, pic from medium

The string theory is a very interesting idea that propose another totally different way of thinking what made up our universe. Although this theory is very arguable because it can never be tested in our labs so that a lot of physicist do not like this theory, but it indeed gives a very unique prospective and interpretation about parallel universe and dimensions.

The theory proposes that everything in the universe is made of the tiny element called string. It is itself one dimension particle. String theory proposes a unique solution trying to figure out the ultimate equation of the universe, that equation that unifies all four major forces in the universe: gravity, strong nuclear force, weak nuclear force and electromagnetic. This is the equation that Einstein seemed for his whole life.

Before string theory, people think this equation does not exist because of the quantum physics. Modern quantum physics thinks that things happen in the quantum field can not be predicted. We can only predict the possibility of something happen in the quantum field. In other words, there are no equations related to quantum physics since everything is about probability.

Einstein believes that there must be an ultimate equation that explain everything from large scale to quantum physics. String theory provides one possible answer for seeking this equation. String theory proposes that every forces are generated because of specific particles. For example, the one that is responsible for gravity, also the special one, is called graviton. This is a theoretic particle that has never been found by human.

Other things that are very interesting about string theory is that it tries to explain the parallel universe by the idea of membrane. Basically our universe is like a membrane where there are a lot of other parallel universe. Only graviton can sometimes travel through membranes.

cross section of a quintic Calabi-Yau manifold, pic from wikipedia

The Mysterious Black Hole

A simulation of a black hole, picture from popsci

The black hole is one of the most amazing and mysterious object in our universe. In 1916, Karl Schwarzschild first provided the solution to general relativity that characterize a black hole.

Black hole is the remnant of super massive star’s explosion, and it has such a strong gravitational pull that nothing can escape, not even particles and light (electromagnetic radiation). And this is why it gets the name “black hole”.

The model of black hole is supported by the theory of general relativity that a super massive object can deform the space-time to form a black hole and the boundary that nothing can escape is called event horizon. The movie “Interstellar” has a very famous part about the horizon event and falling into blackhole.

View of black hole in “Interstellar”, picture from YouTube

The black hole has three independent properties: mass, charge and angular momentum. The center of black hole, according to general relativity, is the singularity where the curvature of space-time is infinite.

Another interesting thing about black hole is called gravitational time dilation. It’s describing that if something is falling into black hole, as it’s closer to event horizon, the time will be slower according to general relativity. And it will take infinite amount of time to reach event horizon.

On February 11th 2016, LIGO announced the first detection of gravitational waves, which also represent the first observation of black hole merging.