tachyon
Sign in to saveA tachyon () or tachyonic particle is a hypothetical particle that always travels faster than light. Physicists posit that faster-than-light particles cannot exist because they are inconsistent with the known laws of physics. If such particles did exist they perhaps could be used to send signals faster than light and into the past. According to the theory of relativity this would violate causality, leading to logical paradoxes such as the grandfather paradox. Tachyons would exhibit the unusual property of increasing in speed as their energy decreases, and would require infinite energy to slow
AI overview
A tachyon is a hypothetical particle that would travel faster than light, but physicists believe such particles cannot actually exist because they contradict the established laws of physics. If tachyons did exist, they could theoretically enable faster-than-light communication and time travel, which would create logical paradoxes that violate the principle of causality.
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Key facts
- Particle.name
- Tachyon
- Particle.classification
- Elementary particle
- Particle.status
- Hypothetical
- Particle.theorized
- 1967
via Wikipedia infobox
Article
16 sectionsContents
- Etymology
- History
- Special relativity
- Mass
- Speed
- Neutrinos
- Superluminal information
- Reinterpretation principle
- Fundamental models
- Fields with imaginary mass
- Lorentz-violating theories
- Fields with non-canonical kinetic term
- In fiction
- See also
- References
- External links
A tachyon () or tachyonic particle is a hypothetical particle that always travels faster than light. Physicists posit that faster-than-light particles cannot exist because they are inconsistent with the known laws of physics. If such particles did exist they perhaps could be used to send signals faster than light and into the past. According to the theory of relativity this would violate causality, leading to logical paradoxes such as the grandfather paradox. Tachyons would exhibit the unusual property of increasing in speed as their energy decreases, and would require infinite energy to slow to the speed of light. No verifiable experimental evidence has been found to support the existence of such particles.
The term "tachyon" derives from a 1967 paper by Gerald Feinberg about excitations of a quantum field with imaginary mass. Subsequent work has shown the excitations are not faster than light particles but particle physicists still discuss "tachyons", e.g. in tachyon condensation, when they are referring to tachyonic fields.