A grant supported physicist who follows the waves, Garrett "surfer dude" Lisi has merged his work in particle physics with the E8 Lattice in an algebra that fits all of the known quantum particle interactions, offers prediction of other interactions, and points to several new particles.
"What I'm working on is identifying each of the elementary particle fields of the standard model and gravity as one of these symmetries. It turns out that this match is... perfect, as far as I've been able to tell.- http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=-xHw9zcCvRQ -- Animation.
- 21-minute talk by Lisi
- http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/107 -- Lisi's Blog
[The Foundational Questions Institute in Physics and Cosmology (FQXi) referees questions submitted and Garrett now answers about once a month.]
"Other physicists have previously matched the standard model particles -- these are called Grand Unified Theories -- but I'm including gravity as well, which is something new, and technically this makes it a Theory of Everything.
"The interactions between the two hundred or so fundamental particle fields we know of are all known. This exact structure is there in the E8 root system. As far as I've been able to tell it's a perfect match of tens of thousands of interactions, all corresponding to the most beautiful mathematical structure there is. How cool is that!
"It didn't dawn on me slowly -- the realization struck all at once, and my brain buzzed with the implications. So it wasn't a "hmm, maybe this will work" kind of thing, more of a "holy crap, that's it!"
"There are no superparticles [as required by string theory]. I made a bet with a pair of string theorists that superpartners won't be seen at the LHC -- we'll get to see how that goes. I think I'll be able to use this theory to predict a handful of new particles that might be seen at the LHC. I'm not yet far enough along to say more. It's very exciting. I have a fun year of work ahead of me.
"E8 Lattice is a smooth, 248 dimensional surface that works in four dimensions. Intersections between points perfectly describe the known particle interactions. There are several positions left over that may be yet unknown new particles. These particles are more likely to be found that superparticles of super symmetry of string theory.
"This is an all-or-nothing kind of theory -- it's either going to be exactly right, or spectacularly wrong. I'm the first to admit this is a long shot. But it ain't over till the LHC sings."
Garrett acknowledges one potential weakness that only the Super Collider can answer. The Large Haldron Collider will not start collisions until Aug'08. Then the heavy particle portion of the Collider will only be used for one month a year.
The Theory might be disproved by failure to find predicted particles rather than being proven by finding particles that are simply outside the capabilities of the Collider to produce. [The easy ones have already been found.]
Bloggers say Lisi’s model violates certain laws, to which Garrett says, “The math works, we will see."
Bloggers want to manipulate gravity where Garrett agrees would be interesting
Others want to find time going in different directions (including backwards) on which he did not respond.