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A straightforward math tweak could bring tachyon fields into line with the rest of physics.
Tachyons are faster-than-light particles, and tachyon fields are special cases of quantum field.
The math adjustment enlarges a tiny Hilbert space into a larger one to accommodate variables.
In a fascinating twist of theoretical physics, scientists may have calculated how an elusive particle, the tachyon, could exist without breaking the laws of general relativity.

Theoretical models involving missing pieces and parameters often posit new, exotic particles as a way to close their gaps. But these models are complex, including ranges and likelihoods of other parameters. When a team of scientists can sharpen one of those parameters, the new particle can move closer to or further away from existing and conforming to physics as we know it.

Theoretical physicists live in a world the rest of us can’t really understand. They identify phenomena from the far-out cosmos, including things that don’t make sense to our Earth-centric mindset, then they flesh out a model using all the things we can roughly calculate. A tachyon is a particle that travels faster than light (superluminal), which is considered impossible. And a tachyon field, therefore, is something that doesn’t fit into our current understanding.

Tachyon fields have long been “the enfant terrible of physics,” these scientists explain, but recent work has

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