Quantum gravity
Overview
 
Quantum
Quantum theory
Quantum theory may mean:In science:*Quantum mechanics: a subset of quantum physics explaining the physical behaviours at atomic and sub-atomic levels*Old quantum theory under the Bohr model...

 gravity
(QG) is the field of theoretical physics
Theoretical physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics which employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena...

 which attempts to develop scientific models that unify quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics, also known as quantum physics or quantum theory, is a branch of physics providing a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the atomic and subatomic...

 (describing three of the four known fundamental interaction
Fundamental interaction
In particle physics, fundamental interactions are the ways that elementary particles interact with one another...

s) with general relativity
General relativity
General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

 (describing the fourth, gravity). It is hoped that development of such a theory would unify into a single consistent model all fundamental interactions and to describe all known observable interactions in the universe, at both subatomic and astronomic scales.

Such theories would yield the same experimental results as ordinary quantum mechanics in conditions of weak gravity (potential
Potential
*In linguistics, the potential mood*The mathematical study of potentials is known as potential theory; it is the study of harmonic functions on manifolds...

s much less than c2) and the same results as Einsteinian general relativity in phenomena at scales much larger than individual molecules (action
Action (physics)
In physics, action is an attribute of the dynamics of a physical system. It is a mathematical functional which takes the trajectory, also called path or history, of the system as its argument and has a real number as its result. Action has the dimension of energy × time, and its unit is...

 much larger than reduced Planck's constant), and be able to predict the outcome of situations where both quantum effects and strong-field gravity are important (at the Planck scale
Planck scale
In particle physics and physical cosmology, the Planck scale is an energy scale around 1.22 × 1019 GeV at which quantum effects of gravity become strong...

, unless large extra dimension
Large extra dimension
In particle physics, models with universal extra dimensions propose that there are one or more additional dimensions beyond the three spatial dimensions and one temporal dimension that are observed...

 conjectures are correct).
 
x
OK