Einstein’s gravity theory, also known as the general theory of relativity, is the cornerstone of modern cosmology. It was repeatedly confirmed by experimental data and helped to explain many cosmic phenomena, such as gravitational lensing, discovered by Arthur Eddington in 1919, anomalies in the orbit of Mercury, galactic red displacements, and gravitational waves.
However, astronomical observations on the border of the cosmological horizon, where the farthest galaxies move away from us at a speed close to the speed of light, suggest that gravity can behave differently on the largest scale. Scientists have proposed to improve Einstein’s theory, adding a simple “footnote” to his equations, which can be considered as a “space failure” in understanding gravity.
Cosmologist Afshordi, the senior author of the new study, published in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticles, describes the “Cosmic failure” model as the expansion of Einstein’s gravity theory. Afshordi and his colleagues suggest that this footnote not only explains the observed discrepancies on a large scale but also helps to soften other tensions in astronomy, where the predictions of the best theories do not coincide with astronomical observations, including the expansion of the universe and the abundance of super-excesses of galaxies.
The space failure model is based on the theoretical challenges of Einstein gravity. “From the point of view of observations, these anomalies have existed in the data for more than ten years,” says Afshordi, a professor of Astrophysics from the University of Waterloo and a researcher of the perimeter institution.
Over the past decades, scientists have made many attempts to change Einstein gravity so that it was better consistent with observations. One of these theories is “mass gravity“, proposed by the theoretical physicist Claudia de Ra Ra from the Imperial College of London. Another theory is mond that uses