Beyond the Standard Model: What Physics Still Can't Explain
Why our best theory of reality can't account for gravity, dark matter, or our own existence.
The Standard Model of Particle Physics is the core rulebook for everything quantum, and the most knowledgeable one ever created by humans. The Standard Model is so elegantly organized, that it can all just be conveyed in an equation, called the Standard Model Lagrangian. Even though it explains all of this, it still lacks to explain some things, which still remain a mystery, according to the Standard Model.
Missing Gravity
One thing that the Standard Model fails to explain, is Gravity. Every field has a particle associated with it. The Photon for the Electromagnetic Field, the Higgs Boson for the Higgs Field, and so on. Just like that, the hypothetical Graviton could be the particle associated with Gravity, which the Standard Model also fails to explain. When it comes to extreme conditions like information about the inside of a black hole, the calculations go rogue.
The Unknown Unexplained
Another thing that the Standard Model explains nothing about is Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Ordinary and known energy and matter only make up about 5% of the universe. The other 95% is Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Even though we have names for them, we know nothing about them. The Standard Model is basically blinded to 95% of reality.
Asymmetry and Ghost Particles
Why does matter even exist? At the beginning of the universe, there was a tiny imbalance between Matter and Antimatter. For about every billion antimatter particles, there was about a billion and one matter particles, creating an imbalance called the Matter-Antimatter Asymmetry Problem. That tiny imbalance is all that was left to create everything present in the universe today. Another spooky thing that the Standard Model doesn’t explain is the Neutrino, or Ghost Particle. They are about 1 million times lighter than an Electron (the second lightest particle).
The Potential Crack in Physics
Some leading “Beyond the Model” (BSM) theories include Supersymmetry, which proposes that each and every known particle has a “superpartner”, and String Theory, which proposes that all particles are really just tiny vibrating strings. The big question now, is which one of these theories is finally going to unravel the mysteries of physics, and crack open the case?