Scientists Studied The Speed Of Light At The High Energies Of Gamma Rays

Recent tests have demonstrated that the speed of light has the same characteristics and can reach the same extreme point in any place of the Universe, no matter of its consistency. What is even more interesting is that the speed of light is the same as well when stars explode.

Therefore, yet this particular case confirms the theory of special relativity that was discovered by Albert Einstein. Pat Harding is an astrophysicist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

The scientific significance of studying the speed of light

Harding underlines that the way in which relativity behaves in the outer space has extreme consequences for the Universe. He neglects the commonly believed theory, which states that the relativity theory is not applicable when speaking of quantum gravity models involving high energy.

Lorentz Invariance is a principle of the particular relativity theory, which states that anywhere in the Universe, the laws of physics remain unchanged, no matter which force is involved. Other methods are reporting that the fundamental of special relativity might have some exceptions when it comes to very high energies. But one thing is clear – If this ever happened, the scientists would have noticed it.

If Lorentz’s theory is not applicable when it comes to high energies, unexpected behavior such as inconsistent light should be displayed. This happens for the shortest wavelength in space with the highest power in the electromagnetic spectrum, called gamma rays. It is produced by radioactive decay, emitting neutron stars, supernovae, the material circling black holes, or stellar flares.

Gamma rays were involved in the new study

The High-Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory is specially designed to detect high-altitude gamma rays that range from 100 billion to 100 trillion electronvolts. The phenomena it analyzes is exceptionally intriguing.

When a gamma-ray reaches the atmosphere, the atmospheric molecules make it lose its energy. This automatically leads to a cascading shower composed of light particles that are detected by the HAWC Observatory. Data demonstrates that none of the gamma-rays has shown any sign of breaking the Lorentz theory on the speed of light.

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