“For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity has been our best description of how the force of gravity acts throughout the Universe. General relativity is not only very accurate but ask any astrophysicist about the theory and they’ll probably also describe it as “beautiful”. But it has a dark side too: a fundamental conflict with our other great physical theory, quantum mechanics. General relativity works extremely well at large scales in the Universe, but quantum mechanics rules the microscopic realm of atoms and fundamental particles. To resolve this conflict, we need to see general relativity pushed to its limits: extremely intense gravitational forces at work on small scales. We studied a pair of stars called the Double Pulsar which provides just such a situation. After 16 years of observations, we have found no cracks in Einstein’s theory.”
Key Takeaways:
- There is a technique called pulsar timing to essentially use stars as clocks
- After many years, Einstein’s general relativity is matching what our tests are showing.
- We are using a double pulsar star to study how gravity works.
“General relativity works extremely well at large scales in the Universe, but quantum mechanics rules the microscopic realm of atoms and fundamental particles.”
