Einstein Rings are more than just an incredible novelty. It’s also a very rare phenomenon that can offer insights into dark matter, dark energy, the nature of distant galaxies, and the curvature of the Universe itself. The phenomenon, called gravitational lensing, occurs when a massive galaxy in the foreground bends the light rays from a distant galaxy behind it, in much the same way as a magnifying glass would. When both galaxies are perfectly lined up, the light forms a circle, called an “Einstein ring”, around the foreground galaxy. If another more distant galaxy lies precisely on the same sightline, a second, larger ring will appear.

See full text

The film Interstellar should be shown in school science lessons, a scientific journal has urged.
They say their call follows a new insight gained into black holes as a result of producing the visual effects for the Hollywood film.
Experts have also confirmed that the portrayal of "wormholes" is scientifically accurate.
Scientific papers have been published in the American Journal of Physics and in Classical and Quantum Gravity.

See full text

Albert Einstein ... a voice for the oppressed. Photograph: Corbis

From his radical thinking to his radical politics, his disavowal of celebrity to his wild hairstyle, the great physicist’s significance endures, argues his biographer

See full text

Being in two places at the same time isn't easy for mere humans (Image: Chen Liu/EyeEm/Getty)

The same quirk of general relativity that means your head ages faster than your feet may mean we have to go to space to see large-scale quantum mechanics in action

See full text

An interview with theoretical physicist Lee Smolin.

In this book, Lee — always the optimist — made the prediction that

“We shall have the basic framework of the quantum theory of gravity by 2010, 2015 at the outside.”

When I visited Perimeter Institute some weeks ago I figured time had come to revisit this prediction.

See full text

Some physicists think they can explain why the universe first formed. If they are right, our entire cosmos may have sprung out of nothing at all.

People have wrestled with the mystery of why the universe exists for thousands of years. Pretty much every ancient culture came up with its own creation story - most of them leaving the matter in the hands of the gods - and philosophers have written reams on the subject. But science has had little to say about this ultimate question.

See full text

Why is it you can break an egg, but not make the pieces spring back together again? To find out, we have to go back to the birth of the universe

See full text

Physicists want to find a single theory that describes the entire universe, but to do so they must solve some of the hardest problems in science

The recent film The Theory of Everything tells the story of Stephen Hawking, who managed to become a world-famous physicist despite being confined to a wheelchair by a degenerative disease. It's mostly about his relationship with his ex-wife Jane, but it does find a bit of time to explain what Hawking has spent his career doing.

 ...

See full text

(a) Scheme of the experiment. (b) Gravitational acceleration along the symmetry axis (az) produced by the source masses and the Earth’s gravity gradient. Credit: Phys. Rev. Lett. 114, 013001

A team of researchers working in Italy has successfully conducted an experiment to directly measure gravity's curvature for the first time. In their paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters, the team describes their work and note that what they have accomplished could lead to an improvement in G, the Newtonian constant of gravity.

Over many years, scientists have developed more sophisticated ways to measure gravity, one of the latest is to use atom interferometry—it enables distance measurement with very high precision and works by exploiting the quantum-mechanical wavelike nature of atoms. Up till now researchers have been able to measure the changes in gravity as altitude increases, for heights as little as a few feet, creating a gradient. In this new research the team has found a way to measure the change in gravity that is produced by a large mass. This change in the gradient is known as gravity's curvature.

See full text

ONE of the defining anniversaries in 2015 will be the centenary of general relativity. In 1915, Einstein published a set of equations that changed our understanding of the universe. Out went the Newtonian notion of gravity as a force between massive objects; in came the counter-intuitive idea that gravity is a property of the universe, with massive objects curving space-time.

A century on, gravity continues to challenge us. The equations predict that cataclysmic cosmic events should send ripples through space-time, but we have yet to observe any. This year will see two projects aimed at sorting this out: the resumption of a gravitational-wave experiment called LIGOMovie Camera and the launch of a spacecraft called LISA Pathfinder that will test technology for catching the waves in space.

We may even see progress on the biggest unresolved issue of all – the incompatibility of relativity and quantum theory. At the atomic scale, gravity is so weak we routinely ignore it. Now it seems we are wrong to do so (see "Gravity's secret: How relativity meets quantum physicsMovie Camera"). Gravity might play a crucial role in the quantum world. It might be the secret ingredient of reality. We won't get full answers this year, but relativity's greatest remaining puzzle looks to be on its way to being solved, at last.

See full text