Posts Tagged ‘Brian Cox’

Cosa sta succedendo al CERN?

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

[Sotto il post in Italiano]

For thousands of years we looked at the sky wondering what everything was made of. Countless brilliant minds gave their contribution into finding the answer. We have come a long way since Galileo pointed for the first time his telescope at Jupiter: Newton formulated his theory of gravity, Einstein started a revolution when he wrote his theory of general relativity, Hubble shocked the world when he announced that the universe was expanding. Finally, we have created a wonderful theory that attempts to encompass the entire history of the universe, from its fiery beginning, to its uncertain end. That theory is called the Big Bang and is our effort to explain everything, from the first moments of the universe, to an invisible force called dark energy driving its unstoppable expansion. Brian Cox, a physicist working at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN explains what’s going on with the world’s largest particle accelerator and how we hope to get closer into solving some of the biggest mysteries of our time.

Per migliaia di anni abbiamo guardato il cielo immaginando di che cosa fosse fatto. Innumerevoli menti hanno dato il loro contributo per trovare la risposta. Abbiamo percorso una lunga strada da quando Galileo puntò per la prima volta il suo telescopio su Giove: due cento anni fa Newton ha formulato la sua teoria della gravità, all’inizio del ventesimo secolo Einstein ha iniziato una rivoluzione con la sua teoria della relatività generale, negli anni 30 Hubble ha scioccato il mondo, annunciando che l’universo si stava espandendo. Infine, abbiamo creato una splendida teoria che tenta di abbracciare l’intera storia dell’universo, dal suo inizio di fuoco, alla sua incerta fine. Questa teoria si chiama Big Bang ed è il nostro sforzo per cercare di spiegare tutto, dai primi istanti dell’universo, ad una forza invisibile chiamata energia oscura che sta guidando l’universo verso una espansione inarrestabile. Brian Cox, fisico del Large Hadron Collider al CERN, ci spiega cosa sta succedendo nell’acceleratore di particelle più grande del mondo e come speriamo di avvicinarci alle soluzioni di alcuni dei più grandi misteri del nostro tempo.

Per visualizzare i sottotitoli in Italiano clicca su ‘view subtitles’ e seleziona ‘Italian’

Why does E=mc²

Wednesday, January 20th, 2010

Did you ever ask that question? I did, many times. During the holidays I read a beautiful book called, well, “Why does E=mc²? (and why should we care?)” by Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw. The authors do an excellent job in describing very simply Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and why Energy (E) and Mass (M) are equivalent. The book is intented for everyone, and explains very well the theory of Einstein, its implications and how big an impact has made in science and in our daily lives. The theory of relativity is used in GPS systems. In satellites communications systems. All this eras of cellphones, satellite TV and technology have been opened up by his work.

Even now, scientists struggle to understand how Einstein came up with that theory: Space and time seen as a unique fabrique curved and bent by mass. Gravity viewed not just as a force, but as a manifestation of that very curvature. Time dilating, space contracting. That’s an incredibly mind-bending and amazing concept. And even more incredibly, it’s true! Yes, Einstein, that’s a beautiful theory!
If you have ever been curious about relativity, check out the book, you won’t be disappointed…