Strong Gravity in Cosmology and Astrophysics

重力是自然界的基本力量之一，但我们对它的了解有多深，特别是当它比我们在实验室中经历过的更强的时候？宇宙学和天体物理学为在早期宇宙和黑洞的强引力环境中寻找答案提供了一个很好的地方。爱因斯坦引力是最终答案吗？是否存在额外的维度？我们能在天空中看到它们吗？黑洞周围(以及黑洞内部)发生了什么？这些都是我想通过我的研究来解决的问题。现代宇宙学和天体物理观测正在以惊人的速度改进，现在可以用来直接探测引力最强的地方：宇宙的起点，就在黑洞之外。为了解决诸如等级和宇宙学常量问题等长期存在的难题，理论家们正在考虑关于我们的时空结构的全新想法，其中许多想法受到弦理论的启发。这些新理论自然而然地修正了爱因斯坦的广义相对论，如果我们知道要寻找什么，我们可能会在观测中看到这些变化。拟议中的研究的主要目标是研究这些现代理论的预测，并将这些预测与现有和未来的观测联系起来。我研究早期宇宙的物理学，基础理论中的暗物质和暗能量候选者，额外维度及其在宇宙学中的作用，天体物理黑洞及其量子内部结构。我的主要目标是更好地理解地心引力。

Gravity is one of the fundamental forces of nature, yet how well do we know it, especially when it is stronger than we have ever experienced in the lab? Cosmology and astrophysics provide a good place to search for answers in the strong gravity environments of early Universe and black holes. Is Einstein gravity the final answer? Do extra dimensions exist? Can we see them in the sky? What happens around (and inside) a black hole? These are the kinds of questions that I want to address through my research.Modern cosmological and astrophysical observations are improving at an amazing pace, and can now be used to directly probe places where gravity is at its strongest: the beginning of the Universe and just outside of the black holes. To resolve long-standing puzzles such as hierarchy and cosmological constant problems, totally new ideas about the fabric of our spacetime are being considered by theorists, many of them inspired by the string theory. These new theories naturally modify the Einstein's general relativity and if we know what to look for, we might see these changes in the observations.The main objective of the proposed research is to study predictions of these modern theories and to relate those predictions to existing and future observations. I work on physics of the early Universe, dark matter and dark energy candidates in fundamental theories, extra dimensions and their role in cosmology, astrophysical black holes and their quantum internal structure. The main result I aim for is to gain a better understanding of gravity.