Original version of This story Appears in Quanta Magazine.
At the beginning of time, at the center of every black hole there is a point of infinite density called a singularity. To explore these mysteries, we take what we know about space, time, gravity, quantum mechanics and apply it to places where everything simply breaks. Perhaps there is nothing more challenge to the imagination in the universe. Physicists believe that if they can come up with a consistent explanation of what is actually happening in and around it, something revelation will likely emerge. A new understanding of the space and time created.
In the late 1960s, some physicists speculated that the singularity was surrounded by a stirring area of ​​chaos that accidentally grew and reduced space and time. After Charles Misner of the University of Maryland called it the “mixmaster universe.” Popular kitchen appliances. If an astronaut falls into a black hole, “you can imagine a mix master or eggbeater mixing the body parts of an astronaut, just like a mix master or eggbeater mixing egg yolk and white.” Kip Thornewritten later by the Nobel Prize-winning physicist.
Einstein’s general theory of relativity is used to explain the gravity of a black hole, and uses a single field equation to explain the spatial curve and the movement of matter. But that equation uses a Mathematical stenography called tensors Hide 16 different intertwined equations. Several scientists, including Misner, have devised useful simplification assumptions so that they can explore Mixmaster universe-like scenarios.
Without these assumptions, Einstein’s equations could not be solved analytically, and even these were too complicated for numerical simulations at the time. Like the appliances they named after, these ideas fell out of style. These “dynamics are assumed to be a very common phenomenon of gravity.” Gelven Olinga postdoctoral researcher at the University of Edinburgh. “But that’s what fell off the map.”
Over the past few years, physicists have revisited the confusion about singularities using new mathematical tools. Their goals are two. One hope is to show that the approximations made by Misner and others are effective approximations of Einstein’s gravity. The other is to approach the singularity in the hope that extremes will help harmonize general relativity with quantum mechanics, which has been the target of quantum mechanics for over a century. As Sean Hartnoll Cambridge University said, “It’s ripe for these ideas to be fully developed now.”
The birth of MixMaster Chaos
Thorne described the late 1960s as the “golden age” of black hole research. The term “black hole” was only used extensively. In September 1969, on a visit to Moscow, Thorne was given a manuscript by Evgeny Lifschitz, a well-known Ukrainian physicist. With Vladimir Belinski And Lifschitz, Isaak Khalatnikov, used assumptions devised by the three, found a new solution to Einstein’s gravity equation near the singularity. Lifshitz feared that Soviet censorship would delay the publication of the results. Because it was inconsistent with previous evidence he co-authored, he asked Thorne to share it in the West.
Previous black hole models naturally assumed perfect symmetry, for example, assuming that the star was either a perfect sphere or had no net charge before it collapsed into a black hole. (Through these assumptions, Einstein’s equations are in their simplest form: Karl Schwartzchild Immediately after it was published by Einstein. ) The solution discovered by Belinsky, Karatnikov, and Lifschitz, came to be called BKL solutions after the initials, and explained that it could occur in messy, more realistic situations where black holes form from irregularly shaped objects. The result was a fluctuating ocean of space and time, rather than a smooth extension of space and time, which stretched and compressed in multiple directions.
Thorne smuggled the paper into the US and mailed copies to Missner. It turns out that Misner and Soviet groups used similar assumptions and different techniques to independently illuminate the same ideas. Furthermore, the BKL group “used it to solve the biggest unresolved problem of that era in mathematical theory of relativity,” said Thorne regarding the existence of what is known as “general” singularity. Belinski, the last surviving member of BKL Trio, recently said in an email that Misner’s vivid description would help visualize the chaotic situation near the specificity they both revealed.
