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y last two posts were all about black holes
and the so-called “applications” they may have. One of the central applications
of a black hole is a Wormhole. Several
physicists around the globe challenge the existence of wormholes simply because,
at present, there exists no observational evidence, i.e. they have never been
detected. However, some valid solutions of the equations of General Relativity
do point to their existence. Hence, wormholes are often called the “Metaphors
for teaching General Relativity”. You may ask, “How are black holes and
wormholes related?” Well, wormholes are simply two-ended black holes.
The term
wormhole was coined by John Wheeler in 1957.
Introduction
The meaning of the word wormhole is very literal. It has its origin in worms digging
tunnels in the ground to traverse from one place to another. In physics, a
wormhole is a hypothetical feature of space-time that is, essentially, a
“short-cut” through space-time. Whenever a massive object, such as a star,
blows apart in a cataclysmic explosion called a supernova, it gives rise to a black hole. If this black hole does
NOT have a singularity that narrows to a point but instead has considerable
space around the singularity, it is called a wormhole. This black hole would fall through to another location,
which may be anywhere in the universe or in an alternate universe.
What one needs to understand is that wormholes
simply exist in theory. No black hole has been observed to contain a “wide”
singularity. And obviously, we can hardly hope to ever venture even close to a
black hole to observe it. Therefore wormholes are purely hypothetical till
date. As mentioned earlier, certain solutions of equations of general
relativity do contain wormholes. Here again, we know nothing about their
stability. Nevertheless, wormholes continue to be supported by theoretical
astrophysics and are an object of fascination for many scientists.
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