Rather than stretching to infinity and beyond, the universe may have a topology that can eventually be mapped
We may be living in a doughnut. It sounds like Homer Simpson’s fever dream, but that could be the shape of the entire universe – to be exact, a hyperdimensional doughnut that mathematicians call a 3-torus.
This is just one of the many possibilities for the topology of the cosmos. “We’re trying to find the shape of space,” says Yashar Akrami of the Institute for Theoretical Physics in Madrid, a member of an international partnership called Compact (Collaboration for Observations, Models and Predictions of Anomalies and Cosmic Topology). In May, the Compact team explained that the question of the shape of the universe remains wide open and surveyed the future prospects for pinning it down.
About Author
More Stories
Revealed: Chinese researchers can access half a million UK GP records
Teenagers who go to bed early and sleep longer have sharper brains, study finds
‘I did things I cringe at’: Alex Warren, rough-sleeper, viral prankster and now No 1 pop sensation