Physicists have discovered a jewel-like geometric object that dramatically simplifies calculations of particle interactions and challenges the notion that space and time are fundamental components of reality.
“This is completely new and very much simpler than anything that has been done before,” said Andrew Hodges, a mathematical physicist at Oxford University who has been following the work.
The revelation that particle interactions, the most basic events in nature, may be consequences of geometry significantly advances a decades-long effort to reformulate quantum field theory, the body of laws describing elementary particles and their interactions. Interactions that were previously calculated with mathematical formulas thousands of terms long can now be described by computing the volume of the corresponding jewel-like “amplituhedron,” which yields an equivalent one-term expression.
Unfortunately, I’m still at the point in my education where my best response to new physics is “cache for later,” and the fact that it claims to eliminate locality/unitarity seems decidedly odd to my mostly-untrained mind. I notice I am confused, and that LessWrong has a rather large number of trained physicists.
Amplituhedron?
I recently ran across a rather interesting result while browsing the Internet:
Physics Discover Geometry Underlying Particle Physics
Unfortunately, I’m still at the point in my education where my best response to new physics is “cache for later,” and the fact that it claims to eliminate locality/unitarity seems decidedly odd to my mostly-untrained mind. I notice I am confused, and that LessWrong has a rather large number of trained physicists.