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Artist's impression of the Institute's planned new research facility in Teddington.
"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day."
Albert Einstein
"Concepts that have proven useful in ordering things can easily attain an authority over us such that we forget their wordly origin and take them as immutably given. They are then rather rubber-stamped as a "sine-qua-non of thinking" and an "a priori given," etc. Such errors make the road of scientific progress often impassable for long times. Therefore, it is not at all idle play when we are trained to analyze the entrenched concepts, and point out the circumstances that promoted their justification and usefulness and how they evolved from the experience at hand. This breaks their all too powerful authority. They are removed when they cannot properly legitimize themselves; they are corrected when their association with given things was too sloppy; they are replaced by others when a new system can be established that, for various reasons, we prefer."
Einstein, writing on the death of Ernst Mach, 1916
Our Research Themes
Quantum Gravity
Quantum Gravity
Quantum gravity is one of the most challenging and fascinating fields of physics. It aims to unify the two pillars of modern physics: quantum mechanics and general relativity. The main goal of quantum gravity research is to find a consistent and testable theory that describes how gravity behaves at the smallest scales of matter and energy. Such a theory would have profound implications for our understanding of the origin, structure and evolution of the universe.
Cosmic Evolution
Cosmic Evolution
We are actively pursuing several alternative models of cosmic evolution:
exploring the implications of different initial conditions for the universe, such as varying the values of fundamental constants or the geometry of space-time.
investigating the effects of alternative physical laws or phenomena on the evolution of the universe, such as modified gravity theories or extra dimensions.
testing the predictions of alternative models of cosmic evolution against observational data, such as the cosmic microwave background, the large-scale structure of matter, or the gravitational waves from merging black holes.
Structure of Time
Structure of Time
The nature of time is one of the most fundamental and mysterious questions in physics. There are several alternative theories that attempt to explain what time is and how it works. Some of these theories that we are studying include:
The block universe theory, which holds that the past, present and future are equally real and exist as a four-dimensional block of spacetime.
The presentism theory, which holds that only the present is real, and the past and future are illusory or nonexistent.
The relational theory, which holds that time is not an independent entity, but a relation between events or changes in the physical world.
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