An independent institute for the deepest open questions about the universe, pursued for understanding, not for market.
Some of the biggest questions in science have no business case. They don’t lead to a product, a patent or a quarterly result. They lead to understanding. That’s reason enough.
Stars at a galaxy’s edge orbit about as fast as stars near its centre.
By the gravity of everything we can see, the outer stars should move far more slowly, the way the outer planets crawl around the Sun. They don’t. Dark matter is the leading explanation, but no one has ever detected it directly.
A giant star’s core collapses in under a second. Somehow, it explodes.
When a massive star runs out of fuel, its core falls in on itself and rebounds. In simulations that rebound often stalls. What revives it, turning a collapse into one of the brightest events in the universe, is still debated.
Black holes ring like struck bells, and some hum through the gas around them.
When two black holes merge, the new one vibrates at notes set by its mass and spin, and our detectors have heard them as gravitational waves. In the Perseus galaxy cluster, a black hole sends pressure waves through hot gas, a note some 57 octaves below middle C. What these songs can tell us about gravity itself is still being worked out.
Something is pushing the universe apart, faster and faster.
Since 1998 we’ve known the expansion of the universe is speeding up. Whatever drives it makes up roughly 70% of everything, our best theory gets its strength spectacularly wrong, and recent surveys hint that it may be changing over time.
The laws of physics are written in the language of symmetry.
Lie groups are the mathematics of smooth, continuous symmetry, like the turning of a sphere. Each of the forces in the Standard Model comes from one, and physics’ conservation laws follow from symmetries. Why nature chose these particular groups, and whether a larger one lies underneath them all, is still open.
Our best theory of matter runs on 26 numbers that nobody can explain.
Particle masses, the strengths of the forces and the ways particles mix are all measured, then entered by hand. The theory works astonishingly well, but it can’t say why these numbers are what they are. Deriving them from deeper principles would be one of the great achievements in physics.
Most research today follows the money: what it might sell, patent or ship. Ours follows the question. We study the universe from mathematics and first principles, take the long view, and let the answers be worth whatever they turn out to be worth.
What will this be worth?
What is actually true?
We start from symmetry and first principles, not from fitting curves to whatever was measured last.
We intend to share what we learn openly, with anyone who wants to check it, build on it or prove it wrong.
That isn’t a drawback. It’s the reason an institute like this should exist.
Every world-class hub started somewhere. Silicon Valley was orchards once. It took a few people who decided not to wait for permission.
Why not us.
Why not here.
Why not now.
We’re looking for people who can’t stop thinking about how the universe works: professional researchers, students and gifted independents alike. Curiosity and rigour matter more to us than titles.
Gravity, quantum fields and the structure underneath the Standard Model.
Introduce yourself →Galaxies, stars, black holes and the history of the universe itself.
Introduce yourself →Geometry, symmetry and Lie theory, the languages physics keeps turning out to be written in.
Introduce yourself →Simulation and numerical work that turns ideas into predictions that can be checked.
Introduce yourself →If you’ve been working on one of these questions on your own, we’d like to hear from you.
Introduce yourself →For patrons, collaborating researchers and institutions, and anyone who wants to help ask better questions about the universe.
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