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String Theory: Music of the Universe 

Idil Ada Aydos

We are living in a universe of continuous harmony that is ironically hard to realize due to its vast complexity despite thousands of years of scientific work trying to understand what lies beneath. 

 

The Greek philosopher Pythagoras thought that the movements of celestial bodies constituted a musical sound which he called ‘music of the spheres’ or ‘musica universalis’ (universal music). Almost 2500 years after Pythagoras, modern day physicists are now unearthing that we are surrounded with a continuous harmonic humming, at a much deeper, subatomic level. It’s the unique melody of the universe which is postulated in one of the most exciting theories related to space and universe: the string theory.

As we all know, physicists are in a never-ending quest for a fully inclusive and coherent theory that can explain exactly how the universe works both at macro and micro level. 

Einstein’s famous general theory of relativity lays out a theoretical framework focusing on gravity for understanding the universe as to how things the size and mass of planets, stars and galaxies interact, but it fails to function properly for subatomic particles. On the other hand, quantum physics explains a great deal about how subatomic particles come together, however it cannot explain gravity. These two very famous theories not being able to fully  make sense of how the universe works are now being unified and reconciled within string theory. 

 String theory predicts that all objects in our universe are composed of tiny vibrating filaments of energy. As we dissect matter until we get to its smallest component— or the smallest component that we think there exists—  we go all the way down from molecules to atoms, nucleus, protons, neutrons, and finally different types of quarks. Normally, what we believe is that we cannot reach a smaller particle than a quark, but string theory debunks this idea and presents us the idea that inside a quark, there is a small filament of energy that vibrates like a string. When strings vibrate in different ways, modes, or frequencies, they develop into different types of quarks, like different musical notes coming out of a musical instrument as part of a bigger melody. For example, if the vibration of the string is in a certain pattern, then we call it an electron, if it is in a different pattern, then we refer to it as a neutrino.  This leads to a path where physicists can come up with a unique way to bridge quantum mechanics and general relativity and arrive at a “theory of everything”— which would enable us to understand the universe from a perspective which we have never thought of before.  

Even though string theory is enthralling, the validity of its complex assumptions is still being studied. Quarks are being experimented on,with a powerful machine called the particle accelerator— the Large Hadron Collider— located in CERN, Switzerland, where particles are smashed to smaller pieces in high energy collisions. An additional complexity is that it has been revealed that string theory requires 10 dimensions to work and thus scientists are trying to find a way to eliminate 6 dimensions so that the theory can become applicable to our world which has 4 dimensions. Furthermore, it is claimed that string theory is not suitable for an expanding universe that has been discovered by Edwin Hubble— which indicates the deficiencies of this mind-blowing theory. However, on a positive aspect, by using string theory, we can conceptualize the mysterious dark matter surrounding most of our universe as a new octave of energy strings. 

To sum up, a lot of complicated views about the validity and invalidity of string theory are present and are being widely discussed. But one thing is sure: string theory makes use of the most advanced physics and mathematics to provide a way of unifying all the fundamental forces of the universe. So, as we listen to the enchanting melody of the tiny energy strings every instant, let’s retain our hope that one day string theory will be fully able to illuminate all the secrets of our universe. 

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