Japanese scientists have created a new model to explain some of the biggest mysteries of the universe: The absence of black holes and the possible existence of dark matter.
The findings of this study were published in the peer-reviewed academic journal Physical review papers.
If true, the results of this research will help to create a more complete picture of the early universe and the structure of the cosmos itself.
Cosmic Conundrums: Black Holes, Dark Matter, and the Birth of the Universe
This study deals with some very complicated and still not fully understood concepts in astrophysics, so let’s break them down one by one.
First, let’s start with the simplest: the universe itself.
The universe is thought to be about 13.8 billion years old. While it began incredibly small, it has since exploded into the near-infinite expanse of space we all know today. Since the Big Bang, the universe has gone from this tiny singularity to a paradoxically noisy but empty expanse of space, populated by stars, galaxies, and other structures, while also containing vast amounts of emptiness.
But the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation is also present in the universe. These are basically the remnants of the Big Bang itself and can be found everywhere.
Now let’s talk about dark matter.
Simply put, we don’t know what dark matter is. We think dark matter is the impossible-to-see matter that exists throughout the universe, which makes the collective mass of everything in the universe much heavier than it appears.
In theory, dark matter is an invisible substance that does not emit light that makes up over 85% of the matter in the observable universe. The Standard Model of cosmology also states that it is vital to the continued evolution of the universe.
We only know it exists—apparently, since some researchers still debate its existence—because of gravity. Gravity as we know it is explained by Albert Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity. Anything that cannot be explained by it is usually thought to be due to the influence of dark matter.
However, some researchers have suggested a different possible explanation for dark matter, and that’s our next topic: black holes.
Black holes are massive concentrations of gravity so strong that nothing, not even light, can escape, making them invisible. Like dark matter, the only way scientists were able to show they existed was through gravity, and like dark matter, they play a key role in the function of the universe.
However, unlike dark matter, which is so mysterious that some scientists question its existence, black holes are a well-established scientific fact. Most of them form when a massive star dies, which plays a major role in the life cycles of stars and galaxies.
But research has also suggested that black holes can’t just form when stars die. Rather, they may have existed since the beginning of the universe.
These hypothetical black holes from the dawn of the universe are known as primordial black holes (PBHs), and they will predate the birth of stars.
But in addition to solving many other mysteries, such as the James Webb Space Telescope’s discoveries of massive galaxies in the early universe that shouldn’t have been able to form at the time, scientists also think they can solve another mystery: matter dark.
Black holes are incredibly dense and heavy, so they could, in theory, help explain the extra mass in the universe attributed to dark matter. In addition, they can help explain other mysteries. But it all depends on one thing: There must be enough of them in the universe. And until now, scientists have not been able to find them.
“Since the recent innovation of gravitational wave astronomy, there have been discoveries of binary black hole mergers, which can be explained if PBHs exist in large numbers,” said graduate student Jason Kristiano. “But despite these strong reasons for their expected abundance, we haven’t seen any directly, and now we have a model that should explain why this is so.”
Research into the formation of primordial black holes has problems with the researchers behind the study. For example, the CMB does not seem to support the main proponents of how these black holes would have formed.
So when faced with a model that seemed to conflict with the established CMB data, the researchers did the only thing they could: They tweaked the model to make sure it matched the data.
“In the beginning, the universe was incredibly small, much smaller than the size of a single atom. Cosmic inflation rapidly expanded by 25 orders of magnitude. At that time, waves traveling through this tiny space could have relatively large amplitudes but very short wavelengths what we have found is that these small but strong waves can translate into inexplicable amplification of the much longer waves we see in the current CMB,” said Prof. Jun’ichi Yokoyama, director of the Early Universe Research Center. RESCEU) and the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (Kavli IPMU, WPI) at the University of Tokyo.
“We believe this is due to random instances of coherence between these early short waves, which can be explained using quantum field theory, the most powerful theory we have to describe everyday phenomena like photons or electrons. .While individual short waves would be relatively powerless, coherent groups would have the power to reshape waves much larger than themselves.This is a rare case where a theory of something seems to explain something at the opposite end of the scale.
So we are dealing with wavelengths and fluctuations. The idea is quite complex, but to put it simply, small-scale fluctuations in the early universe actually affect larger fluctuations in the CMB. This is a big deal, but it matters because it gives new implications for anything that relies on these kinds of wavelengths.
And it is precisely these short but strong wavelengths that are thought to create primordial black holes.
In general, primordial black holes should still exist. But based on this new model, there shouldn’t be as many of them as previously believed.
But all this is still theoretical. What is needed is actual research to back it up. Fortunately, a joint observing mission between the US, Italy and Japan is doing just that: studying what might be primordial black holes.
The results of this study will determine how accurate this model is.
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