Nobel laureates Kip Thorne, Jim Peebles, and Sir Roger Penrose are helping Vancouver's Quantum Gravity Laboratory inspire the next generation. increase.
Quantum gravity, the theory that reconciles Albert Einstein's theory of relativity In quantum mechanics, explaining is a problem that has plagued physicists for over a century.
And scientists have been trying to figure out how Einstein discovered the theory of relativity and how it shaped our scientific understanding of the universe. Not long after that came the theory of quantum mechanics that paved the way for computers. And lasers and myriad technologies.
During a conference on quantum gravity in Vancouver, Nobel laureate Kip Thorne said that physics is approaching theoretical observations and technological capabilities to prove its existence. said there is.
"This is a time when we can really bring them not only to cosmological observations, but also to laboratory experiments, observations of how the universe is connected," Thorne said. , Wednesday afternoon, at the Westin He Bayshore Quantum Gravity Lab.
"The payoff for the application is really going to be huge," says Caltech professor emeritus and executive producer of the movie Interstellar. Thorn said. A famous name in gravitational physics.
He inspired the founders of the Quantum Gravity Institute to create a collaborative research hub in Vancouver in a hotly contested field being studied at top universities around the world. He was one of the prominent figures in the scientific community who gathered to pray.
Wednesday was a day of public lectures designed to stimulate a wider scientific audience with a series of highly theoretical discussions. What controls the core of a black hole and the structure of space on very short scales is a hard nut to crack, just as helps explain the birth of the universe and the Big Bang.
Resolving the contradiction between the gravitational and quantum physics of Einstein's theory of relativity "has resisted progress for a century," says Princeton University's Jim Peebles, emeritus professor and 2019 Nobel laureate, said.
"I don't think anything will happen tomorrow," said Peebles. "But of course we can be persistent. I think we will move forward and get closer and closer to the answer in the long run."
Quantum Gravity, CEO of Concord Pacific For Terry Hui, a member of the Institute's founding body, it is hoped that some of these advances will come from Vancouver.
"One of his societal focuses is to support collaboration," said financier Frank Hoy, who has worked with Giustra, Paul Lee, Mokermani and Marcus Flind. rice field.
"We have places in Vancouver that people want to go to," Huy said. "It's an easy place to come. It's nice here. If you want to plan an experiment, you have to discuss a lot of things before you plan the experiment, and you might not get the funding."
"We want to close that gap," he said, referring to meeting attendance as "a high school hockey team that is never allowed to hang out in the Canucks' locker room." "Somebody," said Hui.
"You can see how celebrities engage with young scientists. [It's also] very important," Hui said.
At least, the conference was a moment of inspiration for the next generation of scientists and students who were welcomed to the event on Wednesday. I think it's really exciting," said the University of BC. PhD student Avinash Deshmukh volunteered.
Deshmukh's work was experimental physics, not theory, and he did not realize how much theoretical physics relied on experiments.
"I think this institute is a very good way for theorists and experimentalists to really come together," he said.
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