Within physics, there are two enormous foundational systems—quantum mechanics and general relativity—that have been like Macs and PCs for decades. Over time, scientists on both sides have worked toward the other side, because anyone who wants to explain the entire universe has to make the two foundations work together. And, like any decent computer lab, a unifying theory has to be truly cross-platform.
In new research, researchers from the University of Copenhagen’s Niels Bohr Institute (NBI)—alongside 58 other member universities— revealed the secrets of 300,000 neutrinos they studied at the South Pole. Their paper (published in Nature Physics) is one step down a road that they hope will lead to quantum gravity. This hypothesized force, if it’s ever demonstrated in real life measurements, could be the physics dongle that adapts general relativity to quantum mechanics at last.
Hellbound and Down 