Applied Math Colloquium I Neil Turok, Quantum Universe

DC 1302

Speaker

Neil Turok | Director of the Perimeter Institute

Title

Quantum Universe

 Abstract

Observations reveal the cosmos to be astonishingly simple, and yet deeply puzzling, on the largest accessible scales. Why is it so nearly symmetrical? Why is there a cosmological constant (or dark energy) and what fixes its value? How did everything we see emerge from a singular “point” in the past? Many lines of evidence point to a quantum beginning of spacetime. Hitherto, proposals for such a beginning were connected to cosmic inflation. However, new mathematical techniques for describing quantum effects in gravity have revealed flaws in these proposals. More positively, they provide a glimpse of a more minimal and predictive quantum cosmology. Exciting consequences include the simplest-yet explanation of the dark matter - as comprising stable, right handed partners of the known left handed neutrinos - and a simpler, non-inflationary explanation of the origin of the large scale structure of the universe.