VARIABILITY OF FUNDAMENTAL CONSTANTS

Cosmological Variability of Fundamental Physical Constants

Testing cosmological variability of fundamental constants

One of the topical problems of contemporary physics is a possible variability of the fundamental constants. Here we consider possible variability of two dimensionless constants which are most important for calculation of atomic and molecular spectra (in particular, the X-ray ones): the fine-structure constant α = e/h̄c and the proton-toelectron mass ratio μ = mp/me. Values of the physical consta...

Astrophysical constraints on hypothetical variability of fundamental constants

Many-multiplet (MM) method [1] applied to Keck/HIRES quasar absorption spectra gives a shift in the value of the fine-structure constant of ∆α/α = (−5.4±1.2)×10−6 [2]. Theoretical models of the fundamental physical interactions predict in this case a shift in the protonto-electron mass ratio (μ = mp/me) of about ∆μ/μ ∼ −2× 10−4. We used VLT/UVES high-resolution observations of molecular hydroge...

3 Astrophysical constraints on hypothetical variability of fundamental constants

Many-multiplet (MM) method [1] applied to three inhomogeneous samples of Keck/HIRES quasar absorption spectra gives a shift in the value of the fine-structure constant of ∆α/α = (−5.4± 1.2)× 10−6 in the redshift range 0.2 < z < 3.7 [2]. The 1 σ error claimed in [2] is, however, much too small and cannot be maintained by current observations of quasars. We present a modified MM method to set an ...

The Fundamental Physical Constants

established in 1966 as an interdisciplinary committee of the International Council of Scientific Unions (now the International Council of Science). Three years later, CODATA created the task group on fundamental constants to periodically provide the scientific and technological communities with a self-consistent set of internationally recommended values for the basic constants and conversion fa...