OUR understanding of the cosmos has come a long way over the past century, but there’s still plenty we don’t know about the Universe.
From theories about parallel universes to the idea that our galaxy is shaped like a sphere, here are some of the most bonkers theories that scientists have proposed to help explain the fabric of space and time.
1
Parallel universe
Back in May 2020, Nasa scientists hinted that they had found evidence of a bizarre parallel universe where time runs backwards.
The discovery was apparently made while experts were working on an experiment in Antarctica to detect cosmic rays.
The concept of a “twin universe” has been around for decades but the new research has found particles which might just be from another realm also born during the Big Bang,
Scientists used a giant balloon to carry NASA’s Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) high above the frozen wastes of Antarctica.
It reached heights where the frigid air provided the perfect environment with little to no radio noise to distort any findings, reports the Daily Star.
There is a constant “wind’ of high-energy particles coming from space some of which are a million times more powerful than anything generated on Earth.
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Low-energy neutrinos with a mass close to zero can pass completely through our planet, but higher-energy objects are stopped by the Earth’s mass, according to the New Scientist.
That means the high-energy particles can only be detected coming “down” from space, but ANITA apparently detected heavier particles which seemed to come “up” out of Earth.
That could mean that these particles are actually traveling backwards in time which is seen as possible evidence of a parallel universe.
Principal ANITA investigator Peter Gorham, of the University of Hawaii, suggested the only way a particle could behave that way is if it changed into a different type of particle before passing through the Earth and then back again.
Gorham, lead author on a Cornell University paper describing the odd phenomenon, noted that he and his fellow researchers had seen several of these “impossible events.”
“Not everyone was comfortable with the hypothesis,” he said.
The simplest explanation is that at the moment of the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago, two universes were formed – ours and one where time goes backwards.
However, some believed the results could just have been down to a scientific glitch.
Pat Scott, an astroparticle phenomenologist at the University of Queensland, told CNET: “There’s nothing that necessarily makes it a detection of a parallel universe.”
Universe isn’t flat
The shape of the known universe may actually be a curved and closed inflating sphere, according to a recent study.
If true, it would mean that everything we thought we knew about the universe is wrong – because our theories are based on the assumption it is flat.
A 2019 study analysed cosmic microwave background data collected by the European Space Agency’s Planck satellite.
This cosmic microwave background is thought to be the faint echo of the Big Bang that created the universe.
The study found that gravity appears to bend the microwaves – indicating a closed universe.
If the universe was closed it would mean that if you travelled far enough you’d eventually loop back to where you started.
Under this theory, it’s possible that the universe is still expanding as the researchers describe it more like an inflating balloon.
The research was published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
The researchers said that their findings could be “a possible crisis for cosmology”.
However, a number of astronomers pooh-poohed the idea, stating that there wasn’t enough evidence to back their outlandish claims.
The Big Bang ‘never happened’
The Big Bang theory has been the most widely accepted explanation about how our universe all began – but experts have challenged the theory.
In 2017, Brazilian physicist Juliano Cesar Silva Neves claimed the Big Bang never happened some 13.8 billion years ago saying the universe may have been preceded by a contraction phase.
The Big Bang theory states the universe started with a small singularity then stretched and expanded over billions of years to the cosmos that we know today.
But Neves believes in Big Bounce theory in which the universe collapses on itself giving way to an eternal succession of universes.
The researcher, from the University of Campinas’ Mathematics, Statistics & Scientific Computation Institute in Sao Paulo, said: “In order to measure the rate at which the Universe is expanding with the standard cosmology, the model in which there’s a Big Bang, a mathematical function is used that depends only on cosmological time.
“Eliminating the singularity or Big Bang brings back the bouncing universe on to the theoretical stage of cosmology.
“The absence of a singularity at the start of spacetime opens up the possibility that vestiges of a previous contraction phase may have withstood the phase change and may still be with us in the ongoing expansion of the Universe.”
In a study published in the journal General Relativity and Gravitation, Neves explores the behaviour of “regular” black holes.
According him, a black hole is not defined by singularity, but a point with infinite density and the strongest gravitational attraction known to exist.
He said: “Outside the event horizon of a regular black hole, there are no major changes, but inside it, the changes are deep-seated.
“There’s a different spacetime that avoids the formation of a singularity.”
Neves says the hypothesis can be tested by “looking for traces of the events in a contraction phase that may have remained in the ongoing expansion phase”
The physicist added: “The candidates include remnants of black holes from a previous phase of universal contraction that may have survived the bounce.”
NASA launches the largest and most powerful telescope ever into space
In other news, the next iteration of Apple’s AirPods could come with a high-tech feature that makes it easier to listen to friends and family.
A four-tonne chunk of a SpaceX rocket is on a collision course with the Moon, according to online space junk trackers.
Boeing has sunk $450million into a flying taxi startup that hopes to whisk passengers across cities by the end of the decade.
And, personalised smart guns, which can be fired only by verified users, may finally become available to U.S. consumers this year.
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
