Universe Sandbox

General Category => Astronomy & Science => Topic started by: deoxy99 on December 22, 2009, 12:27:19 PM

Title: Inflaton Particle
Post by: deoxy99 on December 22, 2009, 12:27:19 PM

From what I learned in Wikipedia, inflatons are particles that cause inflation.

Talk about it.

Link to Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflaton (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflaton)

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: Dan Dixon on December 22, 2009, 04:08:04 PM

Maybe you could provide a link?

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: Bla on December 23, 2009, 06:47:52 AM

Interesting, I've never heard about "inflatons" before. But since vacuum is nothing, the lack of matter, I'm still a little bit confused about how it works. Since you can't accelerate matter above the speed of light, I assume the only way to make space inflate as much as it did during the inflation is by causing more vacuum, more of "nothing" to appear between objects.

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: InfoBloe on December 23, 2009, 11:26:15 AM

Quote from: Bla on December 23, 2009, 06:47:52 AM

Since you can't accelerate matter above the speed of light.

Apparently there is more than Einstein, we are now believing that there is faster than the speed of light.

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: deoxy99 on December 23, 2009, 02:36:14 PM

Here is the history of the universe:

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/timeline/8204688adb57590462231e4dd7b6258e.png)

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: Bla on December 24, 2009, 02:08:21 AM

Quote from: Bla on December 23, 2009, 06:47:52 AM

Since you can't accelerate matter above the speed of light.

Quote from: InfoBloe on December 23, 2009, 11:26:15 AM

Apparently there is more than Einstein, we are now believing that there is faster than the speed of light.

Calculations show that it requires infinite energy to reach the speed of light for matter. Because of that, accelerating something to a speed faster than light is impossible.
What we now believe is that we can move the space containing the matter instead of accelerating the matter itself. That's the idea behind warp drive and all that stuff, but I don't think any scientists believe it's possible for an object to be accelerated beyond c.

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: deoxy99 on December 24, 2009, 10:56:51 AM

Cerenkov Radiation is made from particles being accelerated beyond the speed of light in water. So, that means you can do that.

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: Bla on December 25, 2009, 03:40:40 AM

I just wikipediaed that, and you're right.
Ok, it requires infinite energy to accelerate a mass to the speed of light in a vacuum. But now I'm close to getting off-topic, so just keep discussing the time-travel-thing.

Title: Re: Inflaton Particle
Post by: atomic7732 on December 26, 2009, 07:02:22 PM

deoxy, whered you get the picture, it looks like its from a wikipedia timeline, with links.