Physicist Brian Greene

Brian Greene

Brian Greene is a professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, and is recognized for a number of groundbreaking discoveries in his field of superstring theory. His books, The Elegant Universe, The Fabric of the Cosmos, and The Hidden Reality, have collectively spent 65 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list, and were the basis of two award-winning NOVA mini-series, which he hosted. Professor Greene co-founded the World Science Festival in 2008 and serves as Chairman of the Board.

The Fabric of the Cosmos:

       Space and time form the very fabric of the cosmos. Yet they remain among the most mysterious of concepts. Is space an entity? Why does time have a direction? Could the universe exist without space and time? Can we travel to the past? Greene has set himself a daunting task: to explain non-intuitive, mathematical concepts like String Theory, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and Inflationary Cosmology with analogies drawn from common experience. From Newton’s unchanging realm in which space and time are absolute, to Einstein’s fluid conception of spacetime, to quantum mechanics’ entangled arena where vastly distant objects can instantaneously coordinate their behavior, Greene takes us all, regardless of our scientific backgrounds, on an irresistible and revelatory journey to the new layers of reality that modern physics has discovered lying just beneath the surface of our everyday world.

The Hidden Reality:

      Is our universe the only universe? There was a time when “universe” meant all there is. Everything. Yet, a number of theories are converging on the possibility that our universe may be but one among many parallel universes populating a vast multiverse. Here, Briane Greene, one of our foremost physicists and science writers, takes us on a breathtaking journey to a multiverse comprising an endless series of big bangs, a multiverse with duplicates of every one of us, a multiverse populated by vast sheets of spacetime, a multiverse in which all we consider real are holographic illusions, and even a multiverse made purely of math–and reveals the reality hidden within each.

Launch Delayed due to COVID-19

Mars Rover Launch Delayed Until 2022

  Europe’s Rosalind Franklin rover, which was set to begin its journey to Mars in July, has had its launch postponed until 2022 amid parachute and electronics difficulties and uncertainty created by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The mission, which is a joint effort between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Russian space agency Roscosmos, is designed to seek out evidence of past life on Mars. It has already experienced numerous delays during its long development – and the latest postponement has been likely since tests of the rover’s parachute system ended in failure in August 2019.

“We’ve been racing against time in terms of getting everything ready,” says David Parker, director of human and robotic exploration at ESA. “And now we have the coronavirus issue, which is the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

During a meeting between ESA and Roscosmos, officials decided to delay the launch to allow time for the problems to be fixed. The orbital dynamics of Earth and Mars mean that launch windows only open for a few weeks every two years, to take advantage of the two planets’ closest approach to one another. The mission will now launch sometime between August and October 2022, reaching Mars by April 2023 at the earliest.

The problem with the parachutes lies in the way that they deploy from inside their protective bags. “They are packed incredibly tightly,” says Parker. “It’s almost a dark art how they are packed.”

During previous “drop-tests”, the main 15m and 35m parachutes developed large tears as they deployed. This prompted a redesign of the protective bags, and two more drop-tests were scheduled for the end of March in the US. However, travel bans imposed by the spread of coronavirus meant that these crucial tests were unlikely to happen in time.

Further complicating matters are troublesome glitches in the electronics units within the Russian lander, Kazachok, which will deploy Rosalind Franklin onto the surface and will carry 13 science instruments of its own. “One of the units will probably have to go back to Russia to be fixed,” says Parker. He adds that the current 14-day quarantine rules in place in Russia make it difficult for teams from Russia and European countries to be in the same place at the same time.

Andrew Coates, a physicist at the UK’s Mullard Space Science Laboratories who leads the science team on the rover’s panoramic camera (PanCam), points out that the extra time can be spent performing more simulations of how the rover will perform, with all nine instrument teams involved.

“This will still be a cutting-edge science mission in 2023, as it’s the only mission drilling 2 m underneath the harsh surface of Mars and looking for biomarkers and life,” he says. “We now just need to wait a bit longer.”

How Physics is Fighting the Latest Pandemic?

Coronavirus Puts Physics in Turmoil!

COVID-19 has hit the international physics community hard, with meetings and conferences cancelled, including the showpiece events of the American Physical Society. 

Thousands of physicists around the world have had their lives disrupted as the effects of the coronavirus disease COVID-19 took hold last month. In addition to seeing many schools, colleges and universities closed to halt the spread of the virus, physicists have also had many of their conferences and travel plans disrupted. The biggest casualty to the physics community was the week-long March Meeting of the American Physical Society (APS) in Denver, Colorado, which was cancelled less than 36 hours before it was meant to start on 2 March.

The meeting was due to be attended by about 11,000 physicists from around the world, including many from China, where the virus originated. Devoted to condensed-matter, quantum, optical and atomic physics, the APS March Meeting is one of the largest events in the physics calendar, featuring thousands of talks and an exhibition with more than 150 companies.

Its cancellation caused shock-waves but on 12 March – a day after the World Health Organization had declared COVID-19 a pandemic – the APS also abandoned its smaller April Meeting on particle physics and cosmology. It was due take place on 18–21 April in Washington DC, where a state of emergency had been declared.

Other major physics events that were lost included the three spring meetings of the German Physical Society in Bonn, Dresden and Hannover, as well as the 67th spring meeting of the Japan Society of Applied Physics (JSAP). The Institute of Physics cancelled all national, branch and group events until the end of May and postponed any meetings due take place at its London headquarters over that period. The spring meeting of the European Materials Society, which was due to be held in Strasbourg, France, on 25–29 May, was postponed too.

How Physics is Fighting COVID-19?

COVID-19: The Fallout!

The coronavirus pandemic could reshape how physicists go about their lives.

Like everyone else around the world, physicists have been caught up in the COVID-19 outbreak, which was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization last month. Naturally, all of us will be concerned first and foremost for our own friends and family. The disease is usually mild, but it can turn nasty – and with lots of people falling ill at once, there will be big pressures on medical systems around the world. It goes without saying that we should all look out for each other, especially older neighbours, colleagues and family members.

Closures of schools and colleges will place uncertainty on the education of physics students and on school pupils wanting to study the subject at university. Physics-based businesses could struggle with absent staff, strained supply chains and cash-flow problems. Countless physics meetings and conferences have already been cancelled or postponed. The Institute of Physics (IOP) has cancelled all branch, group and national events until the end of May, and postponed any meetings due to take place at the IOP’s headquarters in London over that period.

The situation is moving so fast that predicting exactly how things will develop over the next few months is difficult. But once this particular pandemic passes, and it surely will, we could look back on COVID-19 as the trigger for fundamental changes in how physicists behave. Last year, for example, researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada found that, while international travel makes academics more productive and have a bigger scientific “impact”, there is no benefit in doing more than one major trip a year.

There has already been a growing pressure to lower our carbon footprints – and jetting half-way round the world to deliver a one-hour physics lecture will become harder to justify. Big international meetings will continue to thrive, but smaller events will increasingly move online, which will be better for the environment and for those physicists with family commitments, disabilities or financial restrictions. Online seminars and lectures never quite replicate the experience of a live event, but that will surely trigger innovation in web-based conference platforms.

As for physics-based companies that use scientific conferences to launch new products, they too will have to seek alternatives. 

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