Nobel Laureate
Dr. Gerard ’t Hooft
Universiteit Utrecht
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Seating 3:15 p.m.
Colloquium 3:30 p.m.
Northern Illinois University, DeKalb
Altgeld Auditorium
The Standard Model of Elementary Particles emerged empirically as an extremely efficient way to describe all particles and forces that have been detected experimentally thus far. However, in these experiments, the gravitational force was far too weak to be taken into account. In our attempts to include gravity, we encounter the difficulty that black holes might form. Their very nature causes unforeseen difficulties when we try to formulate a theory consistent with quantum mechanics. Is there information loss? Is quantum mechanics still valid? Will general relativity be an exact symmetry for very energetic particles?
Organized by the NIU Physics Graduate Student Committee
Colloquium Sponsored by the Graduate Colloquium Committee and the NIU Department of Physics