# Tagged Questions

2answers
161 views

### Excluding big bang itself, does spacetime have a boundary?

My understanding of big bang cosmology and General Relativity is that both matter and spacetime emerged together (I'm not considering time zero where there was a singularity). Does this mean that ...
1answer
131 views

### Our Universe Can't be Looped? [duplicate]

With reference to the Twin-Paradox (I am new with this), now information of who has actually aged comes from the fact that one of the twins felt some acceleration. So if universe was like a loop, and ...
0answers
59 views

### Do we expect that the universe is simply-connected? [duplicate]

I heard recently that the universe is expected to be essentially flat. If this is true, I believe this means (by the 3d Poincare conjecture) that the universe cannot be simply-connected, since the ...
1answer
102 views

### How is the direction of time determined in general relativity?

In special relativity every frame has its own unique time axis, represented in Minkowski diagrams by a fan-out of time vectors that grows infinitely dense as you approach the surface of the light cone ...
0answers
115 views

### Is it mathematically possible or topologically allowable for cutouts, or cavities, to exist in a 3-manifold?

A few weeks back, I posted a related question, Could metric expansion create holes, or cavities in the fabric of spacetime?, asking if metric stretching could create cutouts in the spacetime manifold. ...
0answers
89 views

### Alternate geodesic completions of a Schwarzschild black hole

The Kruskal-Szekeres solution extends the exterior Schwarzschild solution maximally, so that every geodesic not contacting a curvature singularity can be extended arbitrarily far in either direction. ...
1answer
214 views
+300

### Does a charged or rotating black hole change the genus of spacetime?

For a Reissner–Nordström or Kerr black hole there is an analytic continuation through the event horizon and back out. Assuming this is physically meaningful (various site members hereabouts think ...
3answers
259 views

### Could metric expansion create holes, or cavities in the fabric of spacetime?

Is it possible for metric expansion to create holes, or cavities in the fabric of spacetime? According to the Schwarzschild metric, the metric expansion of space around a black hole goes to infinity ...
1answer
98 views

### how does nature prevent transient toroidal event horizons?

.. and does it really need to? Steps to construct a (transient) toroidal event horizon in a asymptotically flat Minkowski spacetime: 1) take a circle of radius $R$ 2) take $N$ equidistant points in ...
0answers
69 views

### are pinch-off bubbles valid solutions to general relativity?

are bubbles of spacetime pinching-off allowed solutions to general relativity? With "pinch-off bubble" i really mean a finite 3D volume of space whose 2D boundary decreases until it reaches zero and ...
1answer
117 views

### geometry inside the event horizon

I'm trying to understand intuitively the geometry as it would look to an observer entering the event horizon of a schwarszchild black hole. I would appreciate any insights or corrections to the above. ...
1answer
83 views

### Does General Relativity require that Spacetime must be a orientable? [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Can spacetime be non-orientable? Apart from the constraints put on the topology of spacetime by QFT (Parity For example), if the global topology of a universe is that of ...
1answer
206 views

### What is the fate of a 3-Torus universe?

Since it is flat, will it expand forever like a flat and open universe or collapse like a closed and curved universe?
2answers
341 views

### Does spacetime in general relativity contain holes?

Are there physical models of spacetimes, which have bounded (four dimensional) holes in them? And do the Einstein equations give restrictions to such phenomena? Here by holes I mean ...
2answers
393 views

### Is spacetime simply connected?

As I've stated in a prior question of mine, I am a mathematician with very little knowledge of Physics, and I ask here things I'm curious about/things that will help me learn. This falls into the ...
3answers
806 views

### Can spacetime be non-orientable?

This question asks what constraints there are on the global topology of spacetime from the Einstein equations. It seems to me the quotient of any global solution can in turn be a global solution. In ...
4answers
913 views

### Shape of the universe?

What is the exact shape of the universe? I know of the balloon analogy, and the bread with raisins in it. These clarify some points, like how the universe can have no centre, and how it can expand ...
6answers
1k views

### What is known about the topological structure of spacetime?

General relativity says that spacetime is a Lorentzian 4-manifold $M$ whose metric satisfies Einstein's field equations. I have two questions: What topological restrictions do Einstein's equations ...
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