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scpg02 Offline OP
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What happened before the Big Bang?

Contact: Barbara K. Kennedy
science@psu.edu
814-863-4682
Penn State

Quote:
The idea that the universe erupted with a Big Bang explosion has been a big barrier in scientific attempts to understand the origin of our expanding universe, although the Big Bang long has been considered by physicists to be the best model. As described by Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, the origin of the Big Bang is a mathematically nonsensical state -- a "singularity" of zero volume that nevertheless contained infinite density and infinitely large energy. Now, however, Bojowald and other physicists at Penn State are exploring territory unknown even to Einstein -- the time before the Big Bang -- using a mathematical time machine called Loop Quantum Gravity. This theory, which combines Einstein's Theory of General Relativity with equations of quantum physics that did not exist in Einstein's day, is the first mathematical description to systematically establish the existence of the Big Bounce and to deduce properties of the earlier universe from which our own may have sprung. For scientists, the Big Bounce opens a crack in the barrier that was the Big Bang.

"Einstein's Theory of General Relativity does not include the quantum physics that you must have in order to describe the extremely high energies that dominated our universe during its very early evolution," Bojowald explained, "but we now have Loop Quantum Gravity, a theory that does include the necessary quantum physics." Loop Quantum Gravity was pioneered and is being developed in the Penn State Institute for Gravitational Physics and Geometry, and is now a leading approach to the goal of unifying general relativity with quantum physics. Scientists using this theory to trace our universe backward in time have found that its beginning point had a minimum volume that is not zero and a maximum energy that is not infinite. As a result of these limits, the theory's equations continue to produce valid mathematical results past the point of the classical Big Bang, giving scientists a window into the time before the Big Bounce.

Quantum-gravity theory indicates that the fabric of space-time has an "atomic" geometry that is woven with one-dimensional quantum threads. This fabric tears violently under the extreme conditions dominated by quantum physics near the Big Bounce, causing gravity to become strongly repulsive so that, instead of vanishing into infinity as predicted by Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, the universe rebounded in the Big Bounce that gave birth to our expanding universe. The theory reveals a contracting universe before the Big Bounce, with space-time geometry that otherwise was similar to that of our universe today.


http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-07/ps-whb062907.php

I would like to see how this relates to M theory.

Last edited by scpg02; 07/02/07 11:44 PM.

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The Big Nothing?

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It's an interesting alternative to the other Cyclic Universe theory:
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/turok07/turok07_index.html
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/steinhardt02/steinhardt02_p2.html

Martin Bojowald's theory hinges on the idea of loop quantum gravity, about which here's the conclusion of Carlo Rovelli, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh:

"In my view, loop quantum gravity is the best we can do so far in trying to understand quantum spacetime, from a nonperturbative, background-independent point of view. Theoretically, we have reasons to suspect that this approach could represent a consistent quantum theory with the correct classical limit, but there are also some worrying contrary indications. The theory yields a definite physical picture of quantum spacetime and definite quantitative predictions, but a systematic way of extracting physical information is still lacking. Experimentally, there is no support to the theory, neither direct nor indirect. The spectra of area and volume computed in the theory could or could not be physically correct. I hope I live long enough to know!"

http://relativity.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrr-1998-1/download/lrr-1998-1Color.pdf

What's needed is for Bojowald's theory to lead to predictions that match cosmological observations. That would support its basis, i.e., the theory of loop quantum gravity.


"Time is what prevents everything from happening at once" - John Wheeler

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