There are several sci-fi movies such as Back to the Future and Avengers: Endgame which showed that people do travel back in time via a portal. But in reality, most of the people believe that such things are impossible. But an astrophysicist claimed that he found a way to travel back in time. Is it really possible?
The scientist Ron Mallett has dedicated much of his life to the notion that time travel is possible and finally he came up with a scientific equation and principles which clarify that a time machine could be created.
Time travel theory
Mallett, a University of Connecticut physics professor recently revealed that he has found a scientific equation that could help to build the time machine. As reported by CNN, the scientist has built a prototype device to illustrate a key component of the theory. But still, there are apprehensions whether Mallett's time machine will ever come to reality or not.
It should be mentioned that as per science, Albert Einstein's theory of special relativity says that time decelerates or accelerates depending on the speed at which an object is moving. Which means that if a person is travelling in a spacecraft, near the speed of light, time would pass more slowly than it would for a person on earth.
This theory also clarifies that the astronaut in the spaceship could move around in the space for less than a week and when they return to earth he will be 10 years behind the people on the planet, making it seem to the astronaut like they had time-travelled to the future. While theoretically time travelling to the future is possible, time travelling into the past is very different. However, Mallett thinks he could solve this issue by using lasers.
Time machine facts
As mentioned by CNN, the scientist stated that the creation and success of time machine revolve around Einstein's general theory of relativity which states that gravity based on the way space can bend, or, to put it more accurately, it associates the force of gravity with the changing space-time geometry. In clear words it means that stronger the gravity is, slower the time will pass.
While explaining Mallett said, "If you can bend space, there's a possibility of you twisting space. In Einstein's theory, what we call space also involves time — that's why it's called space-time, whatever it is you do to space also happens to time."
He claimed that it is possible to twist the time in a loop that would allow people to travel back in time. The scientist mentioned that "By studying the type of gravitational field that was produced by a ring laser," he understood the fact that it could lead to a new way of looking at the possibility of making a time machine based on a circulating beam of light.
Criticism from other scientists
Astrophysicist Paul Sutter told CNN that Mallett's plans will not be materialized as he believes that there are "deep flaws in his mathematics and his theory, and so a practical device seems unattainable."
It should be noted that Mallet clarified that at this point his idea is completely theoretical and if in the future his time machine ever works, it would have limitations such as going back in time to change what had happened already in the past.
Stephen Hawking time travel theory
The late physicist Stephen Hawking while explaining wormholes mentioned that some of the scientists think that it may be possible to capture a wormhole and enlarge it many trillions of times to make it big enough for a human or even a spacecraft to enter and even with the help of technology such wormholes could be built in space.
While describing the time travel, he also talked about time tunnels, which are just a billion-trillion-trillionths of a centimetre across. As per Hawking, if such wormhole or time tunnel works where the "ends were in the same place and separated by time instead of distance. A ship could fly in and come out still near Earth, but in the distant past. Maybe dinosaurs would witness the ship coming in for a landing," reported Daily Mail.
