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Image credit: Kurt Hickman

One of the most striking predictions of the general theory of relativity is the formation of black hole and cosmic horizons sequestering different regions of spacetime. In this…

Cosmological observations show that on the largest scales accessible to our telescopes, the universe is very uniform, and the same laws of physics operate in all the parts of it…

To most physicists, almost everything about evolution is puzzling.  What determines how much complexity can — and has — evolved?  Why is there so much biological…

String theory has enjoyed tremendously fruitful interactions with modern mathematics. Some of the simplest and most interesting questions in number theory and geometry involve…

The Department of Physics at Stanford University hosted a special colloquium featuring Robert Laughlin, the Anne…

When Shannon formulated his groundbreaking theory of information in 1948, he did not know what to call its central quantity, a measure of uncertainty. It was von Neumann who…

None of us were consulted when the universe was created. And yet it is tempting to ask not only how the universe evolves, but also why, and could it be different…

Many mathematical concepts trace their origins to everyday experience, from astronomy to mechanics. Remarkably, ideas from quantum theory turn out to carry tremendous…

Black hole and cosmological horizons -- from which nothing can escape according to classical gravity -- play a crucial role in physics. They are central to our…

Professor Eva Silverstein of the Stanford Institute for Theoretical Physics (SITP) discusses the physics of horizons, black holes, and string theory.

Black…