Big Bang Abandoned in New Model of the Universe

July 29, 2010 | Source: the physics arXiv blog

A new cosmology successfully explains the accelerating expansion of the universe without dark energy; but only if the universe has no beginning and no end.

Wun-Yi Shu at the National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan has developed an innovative new description of the Universe in which time and space are not independent entities but can be converted back and forth between each other.

In his formulation of the geometry of spacetime, the speed of light is simply the conversion factor between the two. Similarly, mass and length are interchangeable in a relationship in which the conversion factor depends on both the gravitational constant G and the speed of light, neither of which need be constant. So as the Universe expands, mass and time are converted to length and space and vice versa as it contracts.

This universe has no beginning or end, just alternating periods of expansion and contraction. In fact, Shu shows that singularities cannot exist in this cosmos.