Research starts with PhD students

Chapter 148 The best theoretical research since the new century!
Edward Witten, a mathematician, theoretical physicist, Fields Medalist, and one of the most influential figures in the international field of theoretical physics.

Among the Fields Medal winners, Edward Witten is a very special one because he mainly engages in theoretical physics research, and mathematics to him is really just a tool for studying theoretical physics.

Under such circumstances, he was able to win the highest award in mathematics, which is enough to show Edward Witten's genius.

Edward Witten won the Fields Medal for his proof of the positive energy theorem of general relativity, but in the eyes of most people, his most outstanding research contributions are concentrated on theoretical proofs related to string theory.

These include extensions of string theory, Morse theory, quantum gravity, supersymmetric quantum field theory, superstring compactification, and other areas of mathematical physics.

This series of research also brought about a revolutionary breakthrough in string theory, and expanded it into superstring theory, and subsequently continued to expand and enter the scope of M theory.

and many more.

It can be said that string theory became widely known because of Edward Witten's work, and it has also attracted a large number of the world's top talents to participate in it. Even in China, there are many scholars engaged in theoretical physics who focus on shaping, expanding and researching string theory.

Edward Witten's achievements naturally have a significant impact on the world.

Even though he has entered semi-retirement, he is still the first person to discover string theory and is recognized as one of the most influential figures in the field of theoretical physics.

At the same time, he is also an external reviewer for Physical Review Letters, but generally only reviews the top theoretical physics papers.

In recent years, very few papers have been handed to Edward Witten.

This is mainly because theoretical physics research has entered a bottleneck period.

One reason is the limitations found in physical experiments.

In the absence of new physical discoveries for a long time, theoretical research work seems to have become rootless. Without discoveries, it is difficult to expand in related fields, while in areas where discoveries have already been made, research has already been very in-depth.

In addition, there are limitations on theoretical direction. There are actually not many research methods in theoretical physics.

Research related to the standard model of particles has attracted the largest number of scholars, and pure physical theories, including string theory, cosmology, the Big Bang theory, and black hole theory combined with astronomy, have all been studied very thoroughly. Without new physical discoveries, it will be difficult to expand them.

This also results in very little excellent research in the field of theoretical physics.

In fact, it’s like solving math problems. When the question remains the same, all the possible solutions have been thought of. If you want to find new methods, the difficulty will naturally become higher and higher.

Unless, change the subject.

Edward Witten saw a 'novel topic', and the main title alone surprised him.

"Electromagnetic force and chaos field? How are they connected?"

When he saw the term 'chaotic force field', he immediately thought of several things, such as the black hole theory, the original form of the universe, and wormholes...

and many more.

Research in these directions is also difficult to combine with electromagnetic force, one of the four major forces.

Then he saw the subtitle - Unknown physical phenomena in particle collision experiments.

Edward Witten was stunned for a moment. He had heard of the "unknown physical phenomenon" and knew about the energy measurement deviation in particle collision experiments. He even knew about Zhang Shuo's report at the ICHEP conference.

But how can the explanation of "unknown physical phenomena" involve electromagnetic force and chaotic force field?
He continued reading with curiosity and was soon attracted by its content.

When other people read the paper, they only feel that they have seen very complicated mathematical expressions. The mathematical expressions seem to be disordered, but also seem to have certain rules. It is very difficult to understand what is expressed.

Edward Witten is deeply involved in theoretical physics, and what he sees is a very inclusive theoretical framework.

This theoretical framework has a very novel starting point. It begins with the discussion of force and easily includes the four major categories.

“The starting point of this framework is…”

“It’s very novel!”

Edward Witten thought of the content of string theory, and he thought about bringing the content of string theory into it. It seemed that it did not conflict with the framework and could even be included.

Because the foundations and starting points of the two theories are completely different.

These are two fundamentally different systems.

String theory is based on the basic composition of matter. It believes that the basic unit of nature is a very small linear "string". Different vibrations and movements of the strings produce various basic particles.

At the same time, energy and matter can be converted, so string theory does not prove that matter does not exist.

This new theoretical framework is based on "force". If some content related to the four forces is filled into the framework, it seems that there will be some connection between them.

In conventional understanding, the four forces are all basic forces, and they exist independently, with no connection between them.

The four forces are like four parallel straight lines in space. No matter where the straight lines extend to, they can never have a focus.

The current framework allows the four forces to have 'possible' intersections with each other, and they may even become rays emanating from the same point.

This is completely different.

"If we conduct further research and add more theoretical content, wouldn't it be possible to prove that 'the fundamental force promotes the generation of matter'?"

Edward Witten was shocked by his own thoughts.

This idea is definitely not wrong, it's just like the logical problem of the chicken and the egg - which came first, the chicken or the egg?
In other words, which came first, matter or force?
It may sound funny, but no one can prove that force was generated after matter appeared. In fact, it is more in line with the conventional view of physicists to say that force appeared before matter.

For example, the Higgs particle (God particle).

The Higgs boson appears 'out of thin air' in the Higgs field. The Higgs field can be regarded as a force field.

Edward Witten read on thoughtfully and attentively.

He spent a whole day, even staying up until two in the morning, before he finally finished reading all the content. Afterwards, he couldn't help but exclaim, "This research is incredible!"

Because of his age, he rarely stays up late.

Now after reading the paper, he still felt energetic and endured the physical fatigue, and wrote a comment -

"This is the most outstanding theoretical physics research since the new century. It has infinite prospects and may even lead to a whole new theoretical discipline."

……

The other side of the earth.

The seminar on nonlinear partial differential equations of the School of Mathematics of Soochow University has ended.

The end of the seminar does not mean the end of the discussion.

The scholars spent the afternoon of the last day in discussion and communication. For top scholars, academic conferences are not important because the difficulty level and importance of the research are very low, and the best papers do not meet the standards of the four major mathematics journals.

Subsequent discussions and exchanges are very important. Many people come to participate in the seminar just to communicate with Zhang Shuo face to face.

So some scholars stayed for two more days, and they continued to discuss their research and ideas with each other in the Science Building. Zhang Shuo also participated in the subsequent exchange meeting, and he answered questions for some people about the numerical simulation of the NS equation and the research on the fermion Hubbard model.

At the same time, I also listened to other people's research directions and ideas, some of which were also helpful for the "singularity argument of the NS equation."

Communication between scholars in the field of mathematics can indeed expand ideas and thinking. Some people's ideas may not be meaningful to their own research, but may help others find direction.

This is the significance of academic exchanges.

A seminar on nonlinear partial differential equations has accelerated the research progress of the singularity proof of the NS equations by more than '4.5%'.

Zhang Shuo felt that he had gained a lot.

After the seminar, he spent a lot of time summarizing the meeting and then turned his attention to the work related to the CP group.

The CP group did encounter problems.

The CP group now has two important issues. One is the technical issue of equipment transformation.

Zhang Shuo completed the planning of the overall transformation direction, but still encountered difficulties when it came to the detailed transformation of the internal equipment. The main problem was the conflict between hyperon motion control, experimental measurement accuracy and design.

The movement of Corsi hyperons inside the device will naturally affect the accuracy of experimental detection.

They need to find a balance.

Yu Fei led the research team to continue to conduct research, trying to find the most suitable internal design plan.

This is a technical issue.

The other one is the real big problem.

The annual large-scale project review meeting of the Academy of Sciences had just ended. Yu Fei spoke on behalf of the CP group. As a result, the work of the CP group failed to pass the meeting's review of the project.

The Institute of High Energy Physics is a scientific research institution under the Academy of Sciences, so the Academy of Sciences meetings are naturally qualified to review the projects of the Institute of High Energy Physics.

According to relevant regulations, if the work of a large project team fails to pass the review, it will be necessary to submit materials to the Project Review Committee within three months and hold a targeted meeting for further review.

Targeted meetings will be attended by many people in professional fields, including administrators and officials, who will ultimately vote on whether the project should continue.

If the review is passed, the project can naturally continue.

Otherwise, the project will be forcibly terminated.

In this large-scale project review meeting, a total of three projects failed to pass. In the other two projects, one was suspected of falsifying experimental data, and the other had frequent changes of persons in charge and had no research results for a long time.

Generally speaking, not many people pay attention to things like this.

Failure of the review will affect the jobs of many scientific researchers and the research of a large project, but it has nothing to do with ordinary people.

This time is different.

Domestic public opinion knows that Zhang Shuo has joined the CP group, but the CP group did not pass the large-scale project review meeting, which means that the project is likely to be terminated.

Some media immediately reported the incident and specifically mentioned Zhang Shuo in the report because Zhang Shuo is the traffic password.

After the report was released, it immediately attracted a lot of attention.

"Master Zhang Shuo joined the CP team, but the project couldn't go on?"

"Why was it rejected? Is it because Master Zhang Shuo proved that the CP group's research has no future?"

"Then why did he join the CP group?"

"Didn't they say last time that Zhang Shuo was guiding the CP team to conduct research in a new direction? I seem to have seen similar reports, but they were very vague..."

There is little news about public opinion, so discussion is naturally fruitless.

Some media reporters went there specifically for interviews, and one reporter interviewed the chairman of the project review committee, Vice President Wang Jin.

Wang Jin is an academician in his 50s. He has a square face and looks very upright.

He said seriously, "The current project leader of the CP group is Professor Yu Fei. Their previous direction has been proven to be unable to detect the baryon CP signal, which means they cannot achieve the ultimate goal."

"Now they have come up with a new plan, but it's hard to understand."

"They want to explore unknown physical phenomena, and the theoretical basis is the research completed by Professor Zhang Shuo."

“We believe that its theoretical basis has not been recognized internationally and the experimental direction is uncertain.”

Wang Jin continued, "We must admit that Professor Zhang Shuo is a genius. He is a mathematical genius and has a very deep understanding of high-energy physics."

"But no matter who the other party is, I stick to my point of view - large-scale projects cannot be reduced to tools for private verification of theories."

"The CP group has a large research team and has invested a huge amount of money in the past. However, the uncertain research direction may make everything useless..."

Wang Jin said a lot.

To sum it up simply, the theoretical basis of the experiment has not been recognized internationally, and experimental research based on it is full of uncertainty.

If the basic theory is wrong, or even if it is as difficult to verify as string theory, all subsequent experimental investments will be wasted.

When Wang Jin's interview was reported, there was both support and opposition in public opinion.

To some extent, what Wang Jin said makes sense.

The Cp group has invested so much and is now transforming the equipment with the aim of verifying a personal theory that has not been internationally recognized?

The probability of failure of this kind of research is much higher than success.

At the same time, Zhang Shuo also learned the news.

After the CP group failed the project review meeting, Yu Fei called to explain the matter, "Large-scale project review meetings generally do not block projects from the Institute of High Energy Physics."

"The review at the conference usually means that there are major problems with the project, or the experimental data is falsified, or the research has been proven to be wrong, or other teams have completed the research with the set goals, etc."

“These are the reasons why the review may not be passed.”

"If it was before, the CP group was proven to be unable to find the baryonic CP signal, the possibility of failure would be very high, and we would have to apply for a new direction, but we have already applied for a new direction but it still didn't pass..."

"I feel the most crucial person is Academician Wang Jin. Director Wu and Academician Gao also think so."

"They say Wang Jin is old-fashioned and is very resistant to new research..."

(End of this chapter)