New Research Mathematically Proves Quantum Effects Stop the Formation of Black Holes

Researchers Prove Quantum Effects Stop the Formation of Black Holes

Scientist mathematically proves that black holes don’t exist. Credit: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

New research by Laura Mersini-Houghton at UNC-Chapel Hill mathematically proves that quantum effects are strong enough to stop the formation of black holes, opening up a new round of discussions about the origins of the universe.

Black holes have long captured the public imagination and have been the subject of popular culture, from Star Trek to Hollywood. They are the ultimate unknown – the blackest and most dense objects in the universe that do not even let light escape.

And as if they weren’t bizarre enough to begin with, now add this to the mix: they don’t exist.

By merging two seemingly conflicting theories, Laura Mersini-Houghton, a physics professor at UNC-Chapel Hill in the College of Arts and Sciences, has proven, mathematically, that black holes can never come into being in the first place. The work not only forces scientists to reimagine the fabric of space-time, but also rethink the origins of the universe.

“I’m still not over the shock,” said Mersini-Houghton. “We’ve been studying this problem for more than 50 years and this solution gives us a lot to think about.”

For decades, black holes were thought to form when a massive star collapses under its own gravity to a single point in space – imagine the Earth being squished into a ball the size of a peanut – called a singularity. So the story went, an invisible membrane known as the event horizon surrounds the singularity, and crossing this horizon means that you could never cross back. It’s the point where a black hole’s gravitational pull is so strong that nothing can escape it.

The reason black holes are so bizarre is that it pits two fundamental theories of the universe against each other. Einstein’s theory of gravity predicts the formation of black holes but a fundamental law of quantum theory states that no information from the universe can ever disappear. Efforts to combine these two theories lead to mathematical nonsense, and became known as the information loss paradox.

In 1974, Stephen Hawking used quantum mechanics to show that black holes emit radiation. Since then, scientists have detected fingerprints in the cosmos that are consistent with this radiation, identifying an ever-increasing list of the universe’s black holes.

But now Mersini-Houghton describes an entirely new scenario. She and Hawking both agree that as a star collapses under its own gravity, it produces Hawking radiation. However, in her new work, Mersini-Houghton shows that by giving off this radiation, the star also sheds mass. So much so that as it shrinks it no longer has the density to become a black hole.

Before a black hole can form, the dying star swells one last time and then explodes. A singularity never forms and neither does an event horizon. The take home message of her work is clear: there is no such thing as a black hole.

The paper, which was recently submitted to arXiv, an online repository of physics papers that is not peer-reviewed, offers exact numerical solutions to this problem and was done in collaboration with Harald Peiffer, an expert on numerical relativity at the University of Toronto. An earlier paper, by Mersini-Houghton, originally submitted to arXiv in June, was published in the journal Physics Letters B, and offers approximate solutions to the problem.

Experimental evidence may one day provide physical proof as to whether or not black holes exist in the universe. But for now, Mersini-Houghton says the mathematics are conclusive.

Many physicists and astronomers believe that our universe originated from a singularity that began expanding with the Big Bang. However, if singularities do not exist, then physicists have to rethink their ideas of the Big Bang and whether it ever happened.

“Physicists have been trying to merge these two theories – Einstein’s theory of gravity and quantum mechanics – for decades, but this scenario brings these two theories together, into harmony,” said Mersini-Houghton. “And that’s a big deal.”

References:

“Backreaction of Hawking radiation on a gravitationally collapsing star I: Black holes?” by Laura Mersini-Houghton, 16 September 2014, Physics Letters B.
DOI: 10.1016/j.physletb.2014.09.018
arXiv: 1406.1525

“Back-reaction of the Hawking radiation flux on a gravitationally collapsing star II: Fireworks instead of firewalls” by Laura Mersini-Houghton, 5 September 2014, High Energy Physics – Theory.
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.1409.1837
arXiv: 1409.1837

17 Comments on "New Research Mathematically Proves Quantum Effects Stop the Formation of Black Holes"

  1. There is only one quanta that is and is-not but could-be, this is un-bounded, fills all dimensions with every possibility that is or is-not but will-be as should-be-correct

  2. im a bit confused by this, as Hawking radiation depends on the existence of the event horizon, doesn’t it?

  3. Who gives a pile of hot, steaming feces?

  4. Yes, this must be true to falsify the false.Are those ‘Black hole’ things polarities of galaxies? I wish that i saw them?

  5. No peer review makes this position suspect. I’ll stay with my own calc’s for now. All so called black holes are exit points for matter from our universe. Each one representing a new bubble. Matter from exit point plus energy from fracture of space/time continuum = new potential universe. Most don’t survive and replenish continuum. One in several octillion do, hence ours! Only one true singularity needed to start it off, and its turtles all the way down? P.S. I believe I’m right on everything but the turtles. Awaiting peer review. J.F. lol

  6. yeah… explain the massive influx of matter at the very center of the galaxy that doesn’t have the courtesy to reimerge…

  7. not saying that the original information doesn’t emerge after the blck hole disappates, only that the information that does emerge is useless because it is not in the same order as it was taken in and therefore useless…

  8. The way in which modern science study the universe and its origin, so far as the logic of fictional and non-existent big bang of us at the present time. In the study of such complex enigma, as the source of origin of matter and many of its properties such as gravity, magnetism, heat, electrical charge, and all that in which it is located and how it all measures (time and space), Science applied mathematics, and some models, and rejects the consciousness of people and their intuition. So confusing terms what it is that the universe and what Cosmos. If these two entities are identified, then science has no chance to get rid of anything. Take the Cosmos entity created from the basic substance of the universe -from ether, and this is manifested in the form of part materials and different energies. It can expand and shrink, measured and observed instruments. His part may be returned to the ether through a black hole when it reach critical mass and gravity. This is not a random process, but rather a pre-determined cycle events regulated by the absolute consciousness of the universe (unlimited power of creation). The current majority of scientists is so stubborn to think that the people of this structure can “unlock” the secret treasures of the Creator and to overcome in creating. An example of such nonsense and seek ways for people to create the “God” particle, which should show how the universe was created. Imagine how funny it was and is incomprehensible for anyone who is our “patented” such that we can so something to think and not be convinced that we can achieve. Because it’s all about the BB and all his absolutely ridiculous and not use for any scientific progress. It’s just a contamination of our individual consciousness, which should be linked to the Absolute consciousness of the universe.

    • It must be great being you. No need to provide evidence for any of your ideas, or even make them coherent. Whatever your feelings and intuition tell you is clearly enough on its own.

  9. When you look at the expansion of the star prior to exploding,, the magnetic field,, jumps just like the star,, it swells as the star does.. When the star explodes,, That very same magnetic field, will expand,, and then collapse back into the star.

    This pools free electrons, from the entire solar system that the star is in. As they all line in the same direction of the solar system as the Magnetics go into flux, and then rebound in from the collapse. Its when you take into the account of two different viable options.

    1. Spacetime for compression on a black hole, has to be done by fluid dynamics, and in a enclosing helical sphere.

    2. Concentrated electron flow, in a rebounding flux towards the stars core,, prior to its increased acceleration of rotation, causing magnetic compression through free electron accumulation.

  10. interesting..but confused

  11. “A Possible Resolution of the Black Hole Information Paradox” was presented at the 2013 Rochester Conference on Quantum Information and Measurement
    http://www.opticsinfobase.org/abstract.cfm?URI=QIM-2013-W6.01
    For those without a paid subscription the paper can be found here
    http://vixra.org/abs/1304.0036

  12. If this new theory is proved true , then it will also mean that the Big Bang could not have occurred.

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