At the time of the big bang, our universe may not have had exactly three dimensions of space and one of time, according to some theorists. In the 6 August Physical Review Letters, a team proposes a way to observe the postulated transition to our current universe using so-called metamaterials, structures in which the propagation of light can be precisely controlled. Experiments on such structures, they say, could test predictions that a "big flash" of radiation would accompany changes in the structure of spacetime that may have occurred in the early universe.
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