what is causing gravitational pull in between massive bodies?     according to books, what i learnt is graviton particle &amp; some books are saying quantum field is the cause, so which is causing gravitational pull?
122606
Ok,this is a silly question. But for quite long I have been thinking about this. What is gravitation all about?? My book directly writes since force of gravitation is directly proportional to the masses and inversly proportional to the square of the distance ie. $$F = G\frac{M_1 . M_2}{r^2}$$ . So is this gravitation all about? What is the cause of it? The book then says     We are not in the scope in classical approach so as to discuss the cause of this. However,as a matter of fact that if there are more than one mass,then there is gravitation as it is their fundamental property.( Cause of gravitation can be attributed to exchange of non-classical particles between the masses) .    Then it ended the talkings. What are those non-classical particles? Why and how are they exchanged? So far I have studied physics , I never found such weird phenomenon like this. I want to know what is the cause of gravitation and what is the cause of exchange of those so-called non-classical particles? And how do they do it?
121309
The  (disclaimer: I don't know this wikipedia entry) is usually mentioned as the reason why gravitons may not be composite particles. I do understand the proof of the theorem, but not the previous conclusion.   The theorem states that in an interacting and Poincare invariant quantum field theory, there are not massless, spin-2 particles unless there exists a gauge symmetry — which makes the energy-momentum tensor non-covariant (actually covariant up to a gauge transformation) under Lorentz transformations in the Fock space. So the immediate conclusion of the theorem is that the existence of a massless, spin-2 particle (like a graviton) requires linearized diffeomorphisms.  My question is: why do linearized diffeomorphisms imply that gravitons are elementary particles? Or, more in general, why  the particle corresponding to a gauge field must be elementary (I know that a gauge symmetry must be exact, but why this implies that the corresponding particle must be elementary?).
112220
How would one look for and confirm existence of a graviton?  Someone was speaking to me about perhaps one day discovering the graviton, but to me it seems unlikely, although I'm young and essentially quite naive, so am coming to you physicists to ask    What actually is the likelihood of finding it?  How would we find it?
50368
The quantum mechanics of Coloumb-force bound states of atomic nuclei and electrons lead to the extremely rich theory of molecules. In particular, I think the richness of the theory is related to the large mass ratio between the nucleon and the electron. This mass ratio leads to the Born-Oppenheimer approximation which gives rise to a complicated effective potential for the nuclei which posses many local minima: the molecules.  I wonder whether there are analogical phenomena in which the bound states are gravitational. It seems that if we take a collection of electrically neutral molecules and neutrinos, it should be possible to form a large number of bound states, in particular because of the large (not so long ago deemed infinite) mass ratio between molecules and neutrions. Of course neutrinos are highly relativistic and I can't tell how it affects things.  Now, even if we leave neutrinos alone, the typical size of such a bound state is  $$\frac{\hbar^2}{G  m^3}$$  where $m$ is proton mass. Google calculator reveals this to be 3.8 million light years. Holy moly! However, this is still much smaller than the observable universe. Can there be places in the universe sufficiently empty to contain such bound states? What would be the effect of general relativistic phenomena (expansion of space)? EDIT: I guess no place is sufficiently empty at least because background radiation is everywhere. Maybe these creatures will become relevant in a very distant future when the background radiation cools off considerably?  Summing up:     What is known about the quantum mechanics of gravitational bound states of electrically neutral molecules and neutrinos?   I'm tagging the question as "quantum gravity" since it involves gravity and quantum mechanics. Of course it is not quantum gravity in the usual sense of studying Planck-scale phenomena. I think the tag is still appropriate  EDIT: Gravitional bound states of molecules will often be unstable with respect to collapse to a van der Waals bound state (thx Vladimir for bring up the issue of vad der Waals interaction in the comments). However the lifetime of these states is very long.
11921
So I understand the concept of gravity, in that it's not actually a force, but more of a displacement in the spacetime grid. An object with a big enough mass will bend the spacetime, causing smaller objects to "attract" to it (not really, but good enough for what I am trying to figure out)   Ok so that makes sense, but what I am not understanding is, how come planets don't just get engulfed by the Sun? There must be something acting against the gravity for the planet to be a certain distance away from the sun. Am I not understanding this concept correctly?
41605
Particles in gravitational fields are subject to gravitational time dilation. The closer a particle is near a gravitational source, the slower is running its clock. I would like to know more about the relation between gravity and gravitational time dilation.  In order to get a rough impression I used Newton's gravity equation (which may be used for weak fields, and I found that gravity and time dilation are (approximately) proportional: Can this result be confirmed on the base of Einstein's field equation (maybe even for stronger fields)?  dτ = proper time of a particle in the gravitation field of Earth, dt = proper time of an observer in infinity, rs = Schwarzschild radius of Earth, r = distance particle - center of Earth  Gravitational time dilation:  $\frac{dτ}{dt}=\sqrt{1- \frac{r_s}{r}} ≈ 1- \frac{r_s}{2r}$   Time dilation (difference):  $1-\frac{dτ}{dt} ≈ \frac{r_s}{2r}= \frac{GM}{c^2 r}$   Gravitational force (Newton's equation):  $F=G \frac{mM}{r^2}$  \begin{equation} \frac{Gravitational\:force}{Time\:dilation\:(difference)} ≈   \frac{G\frac{mM}{r^2}}{\frac{GM}{c^2 r}}=\frac{mc^2}{r}=\frac{rest\:energy\:(of\:the\:particle\:subject\:to\:time\:dilation)}{distance\:(of\:the\:particle)} \end{equation}  (As a result, time dilation would be approximately gravitaty, divided by the rest energy of the particle, multiplied by its distance.)
122698
I'm working off the article, . I think it's well-written, but I'm not convinced about this part:     So what is causing the change in the particle’s behaviour?      In the example given above, when electrons are fired at a fluorescent screen, when we bombard the electrons with photons the interaction changes the state of the system catastrophically as, despite lacking mass, photons do carry momentum.   Here the author strongly implicates the momentum of photons as being responsible for the collapse. But is that correct to say?  I have read that the  verified that obscuring which-way information restores wave-like behavior. So it feels to me it's more about some "outer" state (perhaps well-characterized as "information") that we don't yet understand that collapses the system, not per se the photon-electron interaction.  Or am I wrong, and in fact for example, the process of obscuring in the quantum eraser experiments somehow "undoes" the photon-electron interaction or restores the quantum state through another interaction?
29871
If two gravitational waves came in contact with each other what would happen? In another question entirely, what happens when a higher gravitational field interacts with a weaker one.
73561
On John Baez's website, , he discusses the problem of how entropy increases when a cloud of ideal gas collapses gravitationally (no black holes - keeping it simple).  But he doesn't give away the answer - instead he implies that, I presume, either gravitons or photons are released during collapse and these increase the overall system entropy.  Can someone please answer which it is, gravitons or photons?  If gravitons (or gravity waves), then does this mean that pre-20th century physicists, with no notion of gravity waves, would have concluded that gravitational attraction violates the 2nd law?  And if photons, then what about if the gas particles were totally neutral - wouldn't they not emit any EM radiation in that case?  Or am I wrong that gravitons or photons are the answer? Thanks!
116339
What is the cause of / force? When an object of mass $m$ is moved in a circular orbit, it experiences a centrifugal force radially away from the center. What is the cause of this centrifugal force? Is these related to the four fundamental forces (gravity,electromagnetic,weak and strong forces)?  This force is equivalent to a force experienced while stopping a mass in motion (Inertia).  But is this inertia caused by some force? or what causes inertia? A photon particle does not have inertia of rest.
57936
I found this interesting problem in :     Given a point $P$ in space, and given a piece of malleable material of constant density, how should you shape and place the material in order to create the largest possible gravitational field at $P$?   Any ideas?
54513
As explained in the answers to  post, photons apparently exert a gravitational pull on other objects. It has also been explained on this site, that gravity propagates at the speed of light.  I'm wondering, though, how do you reconcile these two facts? I'm trying to imagine the gravitational field made by a photon and it seems like there are some paradoxes. For example, how can gravity propagate ahead of the photon at the speed of light, if the photon is also travelling at the speed of light? My guess is the solution is probably found in relativity, but I certainly can't figure it out.   Right now, the best I can do is to think about gravity as sound, and a photon as an object travelling at the speed of sound. Can anyone help me out?
70223
I studied the theoretical part about the Gravitational waves in General Relativity (linearization of gravity and small perturbations of the metric and so on).  But I was wondering about: since electromagnetic radiation is composed/carried by Photons (or better:the EM force), shall gravitational waves be composed/carried by Gravitons?   In the end:do gravitational waves imply the existence of gravitons? Or it's something unrelated and off topic?
33841
If the strength of gravitational influence exerted by a body is derived from its mass and energy then is it true that a moving object which has some kinetic energy should also produce stronger gravitational pull than a static/slower one?  If that's correct then would it be also possible for an object moving fast enough to produce gravity so strong that it would collapse into a (fast moving) black hole?
116893
In science documentaries that touch on general relativity, it is often said that gravitational pull isn't an actual a pull (as described by classical physics), but rather one body travelling in a straight line on the curved space around another massive body.  I don't know if I misunderstood that or if it's just an oversimplification meant to help the uninitiated understand the concept better, but something doesn't seem to follow. If the Earth travelling around the Sun is just moving along a straight line in the curved space, shouldn't light also be trapped in orbit around the Sun?  I expect the actual equations in the theory also take into account a body's velocity, not just the curvature.
63416
My knowledge on this particular field of physics is very sketchy, but I frequently hear of a theoretical "graviton", the quantum of the gravitational field.  So I guess most physicists' assumption is that gravity can be described by a QFT?  But I find this weird, because gravity seems so incredibly different from the other forces (yes, I know "weirdness" isn't any sort of scientific deduction principle).  For relative strengths:   Strong force: $10^{38}$ Electromagnetic force: $10^{36}$ Weak force: $10^{25}$ Gravity: $1$   Not only does gravity have a vastly weaker magnitude, it also has a very strange interaction with everything else.  Consider the Standard Model interactions:    No particle (or field) interacts directly with all other fields.  Heck, gluons only barely interact with the rest of them.  So why is it then that anything that has energy (e.g. everything that exists) also has a gravitational interaction?  Gravity seems unique in that all particles interact through it.  Then there's the whole issue of affecting spacetime.  As far as I'm aware, properties such as charge, spin, color, etc. don't affect spacetime (only the energy related to these properties).
118480
The  and  and  forces require particles like  and . But in case of gravity there is no such particle found.  Every mass bearing object creates a gravitational field around it, and whenever another mass bearing object enters its field the gravitational force comes into operation.  If all other forces of nature have some particles associated with them why should gravity be an exception?  And if there is no such particle, what exactly is the  and how does it spread over an infinite distance and cause the gravitational force to operate?    Note: I am a high school student and have not studied .