A speed of light theory test has been developed by two professors to test Albert Einstein's assumption that the speed of light is constant throughout any situation.
João Magueijo, a professor at the Imperial College London, working with Niayesh Afshordi, of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Canada, said he has made a prediction that could be used to test the theory's validity, according to a statement from Imperial College.
The college's statement said that Einstein's current speed of light theory "underpins many theories in physics" and plays a role in models of what happened after the Big Bang. The scientists have developed a new theory that the speed of light is variable.
"The theory, which we first proposed in the late-1990s, has now reached a maturity point – it has produced a testable prediction," Magueijo said in the Imperial College statement. "If observations in the near future do find this number to be accurate, it could lead to a modification of Einstein's theory of gravity.
"The idea that the speed of light could be variable was radical when first proposed, but with a numerical prediction, it becomes something physicists can actually test. If true, it would mean that the laws of nature were not always the same as they are today," Magueijo continued.
Magueijo and Afshordi's work, which theorizes that the fluctuations in the early universe that formed galaxies were likely influenced by a varying speed of light, was published in the journal Physical Review D last week.
Imperial College wrote that Magueijo and Afshordi have used a model to put an exact figure on the spectral index. The statement said that cosmologists are currently getting ever more precise readings of this figure, so that the prediction could soon be tested – either confirming or ruling out their model of the early universe.
"If the variable light speed concept is ever proven right, though, it would change our understanding of how the universe expanded," said Jon Fingas, a writer for the tech website Engadget. "Right now, the constant speed theory doesn't give enough time for light to have traveled to where it is in the cosmos, evening out the universe's energy.
"Super-fast light would fill in that gap and force scientists to rethink early existence. And if light has always traveled at the same speed, that both rules out the variability theory lends weight to an existing inflation concept where the universe briefly evened out before expanding rapidly. Either way, science wins," Fingas continued.
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