Breakthrough in physics: "Cosmic censorship" confirmed, revealing secrets of quantum gravity.

In the 1960s, British physicist and mathematician Roger Penrose proposed a hypothesis known as the "cosmic censorship" principle. According to this hypothesis, singularities—regions of spacetime with extremely strong gravity—can never be observed, as they are hidden behind the event horizon of black holes. Four years ago, Penrose was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for his description of singularities. These are unique points in spacetime where classical laws of physics, such as general relativity, break down. While physicists agree with Penrose's depiction of black hole singularities, there has been no mathematical proof supporting the "cosmic censorship" principle until now. Physicists have now developed a new model that provides a mathematical foundation for the concealed nature of singularities in quantum black holes. The authors of the study, published in the journal Physical Review Letters, believe their model could help unravel mysteries related to quantum gravity, as reported by Interesting Engineering.

Unlike a standard black hole, a quantum black hole is a tiny subatomic object that adheres to the rules of both quantum mechanics and general relativity. While a typical black hole forms after the death of a massive star that has exploded in a supernova, a quantum black hole could theoretically be created in a particle accelerator, such as the Large Hadron Collider.

Although scientists have found evidence that standard black holes exist in space, no one has yet detected a quantum black hole, which means these objects remain purely theoretical for now.

With this in mind, physicists have created a model that tests whether the singularities of quantum black holes remain hidden from an observer when interacting with quantum matter. The model employs gravitational holography, a method that helps understand the behavior of gravity in the most extreme conditions found inside a black hole.

According to the physicists, information about a black hole may be encoded on its boundary, known as the event horizon. This is similar to how a hologram contains three-dimensional information within a two-dimensional image. This is how gravitational holography functions.

The scientists' model demonstrated that when quantum matter is introduced into the geometry of spacetime, a horizon forms around the naked singularity due to a quantum effect, completely obscuring it from the observer. Since this effect is observed at the quantum scale, physicists have termed it quantum "cosmic censorship."

Although researchers have yet to provide mathematical proof of the "cosmic censorship" principle in classical physics, the new model confirms it in quantum physics. This could aid in finding evidence in classical physics as well. Scientists believe that with the help of this new model, they can also solve mysteries related to quantum gravity.

According to the physicists, a more precise understanding of black hole singularities, as well as how "cosmic censorship" behaves in light of quantum matter, is a crucial step toward grasping quantum gravity.