Related papers: Was Einstein Right? A Centenary Assessment
The problem of reconciling general relativity and quantum theory has fascinated and bedeviled physicists for more than 70 years. Despite recent progress in string theory and loop quantum gravity, a complete solution remains out of reach. I…
Gravitational lensing - the deflection of light rays by gravitating matter - has become a major tool in the armoury of the modern cosmologist. Proposed nearly a hundred years ago as a key feature of Einstein's theory of General Relativity,…
This document gathers the notes of a 30-hour review course on gravitation, which I delivered in January 2018 and January 2019 at the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences of Cameroon (AIMS-Cameroon). Its main goal is to propose a big…
Einstein's theory of general relativity describes gravity as the interaction of particles with space-time geometry, as opposed to interacting with a physical fluid, as in the old gravitational aether theories. Moreover, any theoretical…
The idea of quantum relativity as a generalized, or rather deformed, version of Einstein (special) relativity has been taking shape in recent years. Following the perspective of deformations, while staying within the framework of Lie…
This article is an extended version of the article published by EDP Sciences at the occasion of the 150 years of the ``Soci\'et\'e Fran\c{c}aise de Physique'' (in French)
Neither the world nor science came to an end when the gunfire stopped on 11 November 1918 (close to 11 AM in some time zone), but neither would ever be the same again. Part I of this inquiry (Observatory 138, 46-58, April 2018) looked at…
We discuss perspectives for new tests of general relativity which are based on recent technological developments as well as new ideas. We focus our attention on tests performed with atomic clocks and do not repeat arguments present in the…
The fortieth anniversary of the original construction of Supergravity provides an opportunity to combine some reminiscences of its early days with an assessment of its impact on the quest for a quantum theory of gravity.
The confrontation between Einstein's gravitation theory and experimental results, notably binary pulsar data, is summarized and its significance discussed. Experiment and theory agree at the 10^{-3} level or better. All the basic structures…
Starting with Einstein's famous papers of 1905, we review some of the ensuing developments and their impact on present-day physics. We attempt to cover topics that are of interest to historians and philosophers of science as well as to…
This is a brief introduction to general relativity, designed for both students and teachers of the subject. While there are many excellent expositions of general relativity, few adequately explain the geometrical meaning of the basic…
While tested to a high level of accuracy in the Solar system, general relativity is under the spotlight of both theoreticians and observers on larger scales, mainly because of the need to introduce dark matter and dark energy in the…
This paper reviews the theory, phenomenology, and observational constraints on the coupling parameters of Einstein-aether gravity, i.e. General Relativity coupled to a dynamical unit timelike vector field. A discussion of open questions…
Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity was proposed a little over a hundred years back. It remained a bedrock of twentieth century physics right up to Quantum Field Theory. However, the failure over several decades to provide a unified…
The theory of general relativity, for which we celebrate the centennial at this Symposium, is based on the Einstein equivalence principle. This principle could be violated through a pseudoscalar-photon interaction, which would also produce…
The confrontation between Einstein's gravitation theory and experimental results, notably binary pulsar data, is summarized and its significance discussed. Experiment and theory agree at the 10^{-3} level. All the basic structures of…
Relying on a fundamental empirical identity of heavy and inertial mass it is proposed to bring a status of general theory of relativity (GTR) of Einstein up to a level of Unified Field Theory. To do this, a thoroughgoing revision of…
This year marks the 100th anniversary of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity (1915-2015). The first nontrivial solution of the Einstein field equations was derived by Karl Schwarzschild in 1916. This Note will focus mainly on the…
For nearly a century, Einstein's theory of gravity has been the standard theory for describing gravitational phenomena in our universe. Along with its successes, limitations of the theory from theoretical (e.g., singularities) and…