New Study Proposes That Gravity Can Exist Without Mass

Now a wild new study suggesting that gravity can exist without mass, conveniently eliminating the need for one of the most elusive substances in our Universe: dark matter.

Dark matter is postulated to be an unseen mass which is estimated to constitute 85% of the Universe’s total mass. Developed to explain how galaxies can stay coherently bound when rotating at high speeds, it has never been detected and so physicists have come up with all kinds of wacky theories in order to avoid having to explain the operation of the universe in terms of this unseen substance.

The latest addition to such ideas has been proposed by an astrophysics named Richard Lieu from University of Alabama in Huntsville who has proposed that instead of DM holding galaxies and other bodies together, the Universe is filled with thin, shell like ‘Topological Defects’ which cause gravity.

Lieu first began attempting to solve another set of equations called the Einstein field equations, which describe how the fabric of space-time is bent by matter and energy.

In his 1915 general relativity, Einstein explained that space-time bends around clumps of matter and lights in the Universe depending on their energy-momentum. That energy is, of course, related to mass in Einstein’s famous equation: E=mc2.

Thus, this pioneering research undermines the concept of gravity that implies mass, introducing the concept of gravity without mass as topological defects.

Thus, mass is associated with energy that warps space-time – and it is this curvature of space-time that Einstein referred to as gravity, which is a far more sophisticated concept than Newton’s force of gravity between two objects that have mass At least gravity seems to be intimately entwined with mass.

Not so, posits Lieu.

In his workings, Lieu set about solving a simplified version of the Einstein field equations that allows for a finite gravitation force in the absence of any detectable mass. He stated his motivation ‘was frustrated with the current state of affairs, where there is no empirical evidence whatsoever for the existence of dark matter for a century,’

Lieu’s solution is the shell-like topological singularities that can appear in regions of space that are extremely dense and compact.

These concentric shells have a layer of positive mass enclosed by an outer layer of negative mass; their amount is zero as the positive balances the negative. However, when a star is located on this shell, it is subjected to a strong gravitational pull that pulls it towards the core of the shell.

“The argument of my paper is that at least the shells it postulates are massless,” Lieu says. If those provocative suggestions have any merit, “there is then no need to continue this apparently never-ending quest for dark matter,” Lieu notes.

The next question, therefore, is how such observations can be used to either support or deny the shells that Lieu has suggested.

Thus, the fact that one can observe more and more often the ring and shell-like formation of galaxies in the Universe has arguments for the type of source that is proposed here, according to Lieu in his paper. Yet, he stresses that his proposed solution is “highly suggestive” and cannot by itself conclusively rule out the dark matter hypothesis.

“It could be an interesting mathematical exercise at best,” Lieu concludes. “But it is the first [mathematical] proof that gravity can exist without mass. ”

The study has been published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

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