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Quantum gravity

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Nathan Seiberg on How Math Might Complete the Ultimate Physics Theory

June 24, 2021

Even in an incomplete state, quantum field theory is the most successful physical theory ever discovered. Nathan Seiberg, one of its leading architects, talks about the gaps in QFT and how mathematicians could fill them.

Mathematicians Prove 2D Version of Quantum Gravity Really Works

June 17, 2021

In three towering papers, a team of mathematicians has worked out the details of Liouville quantum field theory, a two-dimensional model of quantum gravity.

The Mystery at the Heart of Physics That Only Math Can Solve

June 10, 2021

The accelerating effort to understand the mathematics of quantum field theory will have profound consequences for both math and physics.

Quantum Mischief Rewrites the Laws of Cause and Effect

March 11, 2021

Spurred on by quantum experiments that scramble the ordering of causes and their effects, some physicists are figuring out how to abandon causality altogether.

What Is a Particle?

November 12, 2020

It has been thought of as many things: a pointlike object, an excitation of a field, a speck of pure math that has cut into reality. But never has physicists’ conception of a particle changed more than it is changing now.

The Most Famous Paradox in Physics Nears Its End

October 29, 2020

In a landmark series of calculations, physicists have proved that black holes can shed information.

Q&A

The Physicist Who Slayed Gravity’s Ghosts

August 18, 2020

Claudia de Rham showed how theories of “massive gravity” could potentially get rid of the need for dark energy.

How the Bits of Quantum Gravity Can Buzz

July 23, 2020

New calculations show how hypothetical particles called gravitons would give rise to a special kind of noise.

Black Hole Paradoxes Reveal a Fundamental Link Between Energy and Order

May 28, 2020

By chewing on the problems posed by “extremal” black holes, physicists have exposed a surprising and universal connection between energy and entropy.

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