The new theory, scientists believe, solves long-standing mysteries of physics, including the black hole information paradox and the nature of dark matter. Physicists at Leiden University in the Netherlands believe their theory, called the “Quantum Memory Matrix,” could help explain some of the universe’s biggest mysteries. The theory says that spacetime itself stores a history of quantum information in “memory cells.” It’s another theory that attempts to explain the paradoxes that arise when general relativity and quantum field theory collide, Popular Mechanics reports. The black hole information paradox was first posed in the 1970s by physicist Stephen Hawking. The paradox boils down to the idea that black holes destroy information via Hawking radiation over incredibly long periods of time. But quantum field theory suggests that quantum information cannot be destroyed, but must instead be preserved. This has led to several theories, including that information is somehow encoded in the event horizon of the black hole itself and is escaping in Hawking radiation in a way that we simply cannot detect, or that it even travels to an entirely different universe. Now physicists have come up with another theory called the Quantum Memory Matrix (QMM). Physicists believe that space-time itself may contain a “memory” that records the history of the universe. In a sense, space-time is made up of “memory cells” that could solve not only the black hole information paradox, but also explain other major mysteries of space-time, such as dark matter. “Modern physics describes all particles and forces as excitations in quantum fields, structures that span space and time. Space-time itself is no different, and each of the cells of space-time will have a quantum state that can change,” the physicists say. “These cells can be thought of as tiny dials or switches. There is also a kind of quantum information that describes how each cell relates to others, and it is not contained in any one cell but in a ramified network of relationships between them.” For example, in the black hole information paradox, as an object moves through space, it interacts with these space-time “dial” that imprint the information. When the black hole evaporates, a process that takes between 10 to the 68th and 10 to the 103rd years, the surrounding space-time remains. That is, the information does not disappear after all, but is recorded in the “memory” of the universe, scientists say. By using quantum computers to test the theory, physicists have expanded beyond gravity, insisting that the MCM applies to all four fundamental forces of nature. Physicists have also suggested that the weight of information woven into spacetime could be an alternative explanation for dark matter, which makes up most of the mass of the universe but barely interacts with ordinary matter. The post The Universe May Have Its Own Memory, Physicists Say appeared first on Anomalien.com.