Scientists Posit the Existence of an Anti-Universe Next to Ours That Goes Back in Time

A recently reviewed paper from an international team of theoretical physicists suggests that there may be an “anti-universe” stretching back in time before the Big Bang that could help explain the existence of dark matter, a mysterious but abundant substance that fills our universe.

The controversial theory, explained in a paper accepted for publication in the Annals of Physics, assumes that the early universe was small, hot and dense, and so uniform that time appears symmetrical back and forth, Live Science reports.

Fundamental symmetry known as CPT

The study suggests that the reason for this universe is that there are three fundamental symmetries in nature, known as CPT symmetry: charge (C), because reversing the charge of a particle in a given interaction results in an equal and opposite charge; parity (P), because if you look at the mirror image of an interaction, you get the same result; and time (T), because if you run an interaction backwards in time, it looks the same.

Physical interactions generally obey these symmetries, but physicists have never observed a violation of these laws of nature simultaneously. Now the researchers posit that while this symmetry applies to interactions, it could also apply to the entire universe, extending this combined symmetry.

A mirror cosmos

To do so, to preserve this symmetry, there must be a mirror cosmos that balances ours, meaning it would be filled with particles with charges opposite ours and reflected back in time, according to Live Science. If so, this “anti-universe” could explain the ambiguity of dark matter, which is said to make up 95 percent of our Universe but is completely invisible to us.

Dark matter would not be so mysterious

According to physicists, in the twin universe, the dark matter would be formed mainly by a new type of neutrino –subatomic particles of very high energy and low density that do not have a positive or negative charge–, of which, according to scientific circles, only three types are currently known: electronic, muonic, and tau, all of which rotate in the same direction to the left.

Additional ‘right-handed’ neutrinos could explain dark matter

All other particles known to physics have left- and right-spinning varieties, so physicists have long wondered if additional right-spinning neutrinos exist, but have never detected them. These “right-handed” neutrinos, the researchers add, would probably be invisible, but would influence the rest of the universe.

A reverse universe would require the existence of one of these new types of neutrinos that we can’t see but are aware of, because it also interacts with the rest of the universe only through gravity, similar to dark matter, they argue. the physical.

If symmetry exists everywhere, the paper explains, “right-handed” neutrinos would need to be as abundant as their “left-handed” counterparts, which in turn would be enough to explain the dark matter that physicists have detected.

“We would never have access to our twin”

Scientists don’t think we’ll be able to visit the proposed ‘anti-universe’, since it technically exists ‘behind’ our Big Bang, that is, before the beginning of our cosmos. However, the researchers believe that further investigation of neutrino particles and dark matter could be a step towards proving the “anti-universe” theory.