General Relativity

General Relativity

A circular diagram illustrating the observable universe, showing planets, stars, galaxies, and cosmic background radiation layers—revealing where Big Bang echoes still linger.
If you think of the Big Bang as an explosion, we can trace it back to a single point-of-origin. But what if it happened everywhere at once?
planck temperature polarization
The hot Big Bang is often touted as the beginning of the Universe. But there's one piece of evidence we can't ignore that shows otherwise.
As we gain new knowledge, our scientific picture of how the Universe works must evolve. This is a feature of the Big Bang, not a bug.
LIGO Livingston
10 years ago, LIGO first began directly detecting gravitational waves. Now better than ever, it's revealing previously unreachable features.
It's the origin of our entire observable Universe, but it's still not the very beginning of everything.
Two identical, intricate, circular geometric patterns with symmetrical, multicolored lines and shapes are displayed side by side on a white background—each subtly reflecting the argument against theory of everything’s promise of perfect symmetry.
The Holy Grail of physics is a Theory of Everything: where a single equation describes the whole Universe. But maybe there simply isn't one?
Abstract 3D geometric surface with intersecting translucent orange and brown planes, inspired by the amplituhedron theory of everything, set against a blurred orange background with white network lines.
Since even before Einstein, physicists have sought a theory of everything to explain the Universe. Can positive geometry lead us there?
An abstract animation of white, textured patterns symmetrically forming on a blue and black background evokes the mysterious dance of dark energy, subtly hinting at its weakening presence as if guided by the precision of DESI.
The Universe isn't just expanding; the expansion is accelerating. If different methods yield incompatible results, is dark energy evolving?
Two diagrams: the left shows a complex, circular, multicolored network; the right displays a theoretical physics diagram with labeled axes and colored particle symbols, capturing the intricate nature of physics hard concepts.
When you don't have enough clues to bring your detective story to a close, you should expect that your educated guesses will all be wrong.
A chart titled "Masses in the Stellar Graveyard" shows the black holes and neutron stars detected by LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA, plotted on a logarithmic scale in solar masses, highlighting how LIGO triples black hole haul with each new discovery.
10 years ago, LIGO saw its first gravitational wave. After 218 detections, our view of black holes has changed forever. Can this era endure?
A 3D potential energy surface with a central peak and surrounding valley illustrates zero-point energy power; two blue spheres indicate positions atop the peak and within the valley. Axes labeled Re(φ), Im(φ), and V(φ).
Throughout history, "free energy" has been a scammer's game, such as perpetual motion. But with zero-point energy, is it actually possible?
space expanding
Just 13.8 billion years after the hot Big Bang, we can see 46.1 billion light-years away in all directions. Doesn't that violate...something?
A person in a suit holds up a NOAA map showing the forecast track and intensity of Hurricane Dorian, reminding us that, unlike Einstein, we can't change the facts—only prepare for them—in an office setting.
Einstein is credited with saying, "If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts." What he actually said has a very different meaning.
Two supermassive black holes on an inevitable death spiral push the limits of Einstein's relativity. New observations reveal even more.
Green abstract image with floating, glowing funnel-shaped objects and spherical wireframe shapes evokes a black hole universe, all set against a misty green background with ethereal light streaks.
Once you cross a black hole's event horizon, there's no going back. But inside, could creating a singularity give birth to a new Universe?
F = ma fall up
From high school through the professional ranks, physicists still take incredible lessons away from Newton's second law.
gravitational wave effects on spacetime
With over 300 high-significance gravitational wave detections, we now have a huge unsolved puzzle. Will we invest in finding the solution?
A visual simulation of two objects orbiting and merging, distorting a red-orange grid representing spacetime—illustrating gravitational waves once thought to be the worst prediction in science.
The measured value of the cosmological constant is 120 orders of magnitude smaller than what's predicted. How can this paradox be resolved?
An image of a sphere with stars in it.
For over 50 years, it’s been the scientifically accepted theory describing the origin of the Universe. It’s time we all learned its truths.
A digital illustration showing a glowing blue particle on the left, evoking cosmic inflation, transitioning into a geometric, grid-like structure on a purple background on the right.
A few physical quantities, in all laboratory experiments, are always conserved: including energy. But for the entire Universe? Not so much.
Timeline of the universe from the Big Bang, as described in cosmology, showing inflation, formation of atoms, stars, galaxies, and expansion to the present day over 13.8 billion years.
If you want to understand the Universe, cosmologically, you just can't do it without the Friedmann equation. With it, the cosmos is yours.
black hole baby universe
Here in our Universe, time passes at a fixed rate for all observers: one second-per-second. Before the Big Bang, things were very different.
entanglement across space
If all massive objects emit Hawking radiation, not just black holes alone, then everything is unstable, even the Universe. Can that be true?
Diagram of the solar system with gravitational waves emanating from a distant bright source, and a triangular spacecraft array detecting the waves in space.
Just 10 years ago, humanity had never directly detected a single gravitational wave. We're closing in on 300 now, with so much more to come!
dark energy accelerated expansion
The fact that our Universe's expansion is accelerating implies that dark energy exists. But could it be even weirder than we've imagined?
Visualization of a section through the large-scale structure of the universe highlighting cosmic web patterns and distributions.
Since 1998, we've known our Universe isn't just expanding, but the expansion is accelerating. Could the Big Bang itself be the reason why?
A repeating pattern of wireframe 3D geometric shapes intersected by diagonal yellow lines on a black background, evoking a physics break down of forms at the Planck scale.
There are limits to where physics makes meaningful predictions: beyond the Planck length, time, or energy. Here's why we can't go further.
According to Stephen Hawking, spontaneously emitted radiation should cause all black holes to decay. But we've never seen it: not even once.
A cartoon of three cosmic phenomena (CMB, Baryon Acoustic Oscillations, Supernovae) pulling on a triangle. Text below reads: "Something has to give...
DESI, by mapping galaxies, has claimed they see evidence for dark energy evolving by getting weaker. But that's only one interpretation.
Einstein's general relativity has reigned supreme as our theory of gravity for over a century. Could we reduce it back down to Newton's law?