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Testing Gravity 2023
18-21 January 2023, SFU Harbour Center, Vancouver, BC, Canada
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Testing Gravity returns to SFU Harbour Centre January 18-21, 2023, following a pause due to the COVID pandemic. Testing Gravity 2023 (TG2023) will be the 4th Testing Gravity conference hosted in-person by SFU, bringing together leading experts on various ways of testing laws of gravity. Testing Gravity remains a topical theme because of the unexplained nature of dark matter and dark energy and the long-standing failure to reconcile gravity with quantum physics. Like the 2015, 2017 and 2019 meetings, TG2023 will feature latest updates from gravitational wave and astrophysical observatories, lab-based experiments, as well as discussions of recent theoretical advances. The conference aims to provide theorists working on extensions of General Relativity with a realistic perspective on what aspects of their theories can be tested. On the other hand, the experimentalists and observers will get a chance to learn about new ideas that their experiments can test.Wednesday, January 18th, will feature a "school" with five review lectures given by some of the invited speakers providing background into the key topics covered by the conference. The main conference, January 19-21, will include invited and contributed talks, and a poster session.
Topics on Agenda:gravitational wavesastrophysical tests, pulsars, black holesterrestrial laboratory tests, gravity on short distancescosmological probes: CMB, 21 cm, redshift surveys, weak lensingparticle cosmology, dark mattermodified gravity theoriesquantum gravity and emergent gravityWednesday School Lectures:introduction to GR and ways of testing it by Pedro Ferreiraalternative gravity theories and their phenomenlogy by Lam Huigravitational waves and their sources by Emanuele Bertiastrophysical tests of GR by Jeremy Saksteincosmological tests of GR by Alessandra SilvestriRenaissance of GR - a historical perspective by Clifford WillSpecial Issue:Special Issue "Selected Papers from Testing Gravity 2023"
Conference Program:
Conference Organizers:Andrei Frolov (SFU)Makoto Fujiwara (TRIUMF)Levon Pogosian (SFU)Dimitrios Psaltis (Georgia Tech)Douglas Scott (UBC)Alessandra Silvestri (Leiden)subscribe to conference newscontact organizing committee
Invited Speakers:Hartmut Abele (Vienna)Niayesh Afshordi (Perimeter/Waterloo)Emanuele Berti (Johns Hopkins)Cliff Burgess (Perimeter)Claudia de Rham (Imperial)Pedro Ferreira (Oxford)Ruth Gregory (Kings College)Lam Hui (Columbia)Mark Kasevich (Stanford)Justin Khoury (U Penn)Hayley Macpherson (Chicago)Jess McIver (UBC)Lia Medeiros (IAS)Gopolang Mohlabeng (Irvine/SFU)Will Percival (Perimeter/Waterloo)Frans Pretorius (Princeton)Marco Raveri (Genova)Jeremy Sakstein (Hawaii)Misao Sasaki (Tokyo)Armen Sedrakian (Frankfurt)Mark Trodden (UPenn)Tanmay Vachaspati (ASU)Silke Weinfurtner (Nottingham)Registered Participants:current registered participant listCode of Conduct:code of conduct
The registration fee is 300 CAD for regular and 150 CAD for student participants if paid prior to November 30th, 2022. After that, the fees increase at 400 and 200 CAD respectively. Banquet tickets are 80 CAD per person.The additional fee for attendance of the pre-conference school is 50 CAD. The school will feature five lectures by some of the invited conference speakers. Lectures will cover an introduction to General Relativity (GR), binary systems and gravitational waves, neutron stars and astrophysical tests of GR, review of alternative gravity theories, and cosmological tests of GR.
Registration closes January 13th, 2023. Cancellations are subject to 10% penalty, with no refunds after January 6th, 2023. Payment of registration fees is processed online by SFU Meeting, Event and Conference Services. All credit card transactions will be processed in Canadian dollars and are subject to current exchange rates.
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November 30th,
2022
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Workshop Venue:The meeting will take place in the SFU Harbour Centre, located near the waterfront in the downtown Vancouver core. It is easily accessible from the airport and is surrounded by a vibrant neighbourhood.
Accommodations:Delta Vancouver Suites:550 West Hastings St. (across the street, 220 CAD/night+17.5% tax)
Last day to book: November 24th, 2022. To book online, use this weblink. Alternatively, you can call Marriott Reservations at +1(844)254-5048 and provide the code "SPG" to get the above rate.Sandman Hotel Vancouver:180 West Georgia St. (10 mins walk, 119 CAD/night+17.5% tax)
Book using this weblink no later than January 3rd, 2023, to get the special rate. If booking via the generic hotel website or by phone, provide the code "TG2023".
For your travel plans reference, the pre-workshop school will start at 9 am on Wednesday, January 18th. The workshop will start at 9 am on Thursday, January 19th and end on Saturday, January 21st. Conference dinner is planned for the evening of Friday, January 20th. Arriving the evening before the meeting starts is probably the best way to schedule your travel, and you can stay a few extra days for a weekend in the city or on ski slopes. Further informaton about local attractions will be posted on local info page.
Getting to Vancouver:Vancouver International Airport (YVR) is well connected to major airports in Asia and Europe and cities throughout Canada and USA. Excellent deals, particularly from Europe, can often be found on holiday airlines, such as Air Transat and Thomas Cook. The best option for getting from YVR to the city is via Sky Train.Alternative Airports:Vancouver Harbour Flight Centre (CXH) is a seaplane terminal located within a 10 min walk from SFU Harbour Centre. An exciting option for people arriving from the University of Victoria, assuming the weather collaborates.Bellingham International Airport (BLI), across the US border, is about 85 km (53 miles) away from downtown Vancouver. Flying to BLI can be an inexpensive option if travelling from cities on the west coast of the US.Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) is 250 km (153 miles) away from downtown Vancouver. Flying to SEA can be a more economical option, even after taking the cost of the rental car into account.By Car:If you are coming from US by car, border crossing times depend on the time of the day. 10-20 mins wait is normal during non-peak times, but can easily be an hour if you happen to venture at the wrong time. You can get an idea about the crossing time statistics on various websites.By Ferry:BC Ferries runs several regular ferry lines connecting Vancouver Island to the Mainland. The closest terminal to downtown Vancouver is Tsawwassen. Although Horseshoe Bay terminal is not much further away, it is located on the North Shore. Connection over Lions Gate Bridge could be problematic during rush hour.
download printed directions or visit interactive map
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Places to Eat:SteamworksBonchazLa TaqueriaNubaEbisu on RobsonBanana LeafShizen YaCafe CrepeZefferelli'sThe NaamVij'sCanuck Tickets:Special discount tickets for Canucks vs. Tampa Bay game on January 18thThings to Do:Harbour Centre TowerThe SeawallStanley ParkGranville IslandVancouver AquariumUBC Museum of AnthropologyFly Over CanadaCapilano Suspension BridgeGrouse Mountain GondolaVisit WhistlerGetting Around:Transit App for mobile devicesTransLink Vancouver websiteDownhill Skiing:Cypress MountainGrouse MountainMount SeymourWhistler BlackcombMt Baker Ski AreaX-Country Skiing:Cypress MountainCallaghan CountryBackcountry Skiing:check current avalanche conditions!
Wed Jan 18 - The School
08:00 Registration Desk OpensThu Jan 19 - Workshop Day 1
08:00 Registration Desk OpensFri Jan 20 - Workshop Day 2
08:30 Registration Desk OpensSat Jan 21 - Workshop Day 3
09:00 Registration Desk Opens
09:00-10:10 Pedro Ferreira Introduction to General Relativity and ways of testing it
08:55 Workshop Starts Welcome from organizers and SFU Dean of Science, Angela Brooks-Wilson 09:00-09:30 Pedro Ferreira From cosmology to ringdown 09:30-10:00 Jess McIver Testing GR with LIGO-Virgo and future GW detectors 10:00-10:25 Michael Ross Laboratory tests of gravity by the Eöt-Wash Group
09:00-09:30 Will Percival Super-sample covariance and patch-to-patch variations in the universe 09:30-10:00 Marco Raveri Cosmological tensions and reconstruction of gravity 10:00-10:10 Bartolomeo Fiorini Studying large-scale structure probes of modified gravity with COLA 10:10-10:30 Joseph Howlett Nuclear matter sensing of new forces at submicron scale
09:30-10:00 Jeremy Sakstein Black hole archaeology 10:00-10:30 Hayley Macpherson Fully nonlinear ray-tracing in cosmological simulations with numerical relativity
10:30-11:40 Lam Hui Alternative gravity theories and their phenomenology 11:45-12:35 Jeremy Sakstein Astrophysical tests of General Relativity
11:00-11:30 Ruth Gregory Testing higher derivative gravity through tunnelling 11:30-12:00 Emanuele Berti Black hole spectroscopy: a status report 12:00-12:30 Cliff Burgess Two symmetries and a mechanism: UV motivations for light axiodilatons
11:00-11:30 Mark Trodden Coupled early dark energy 11:30-12:00 Armen Sedrakian Multi messenger astrophysics constrains on dense matter in compact stars 12:00-12:10 Qiuyue Liang Detecting the stochastic gravitational wave background from massive gravity with pulsar timing arrays 12:10-12:20 Jiro Soda A peak in primordial GW spectrum induced by magnetic fields 12:20-12:30 Hajime Sotani Universal relation in supernova gravitational waves
11:00-11:30 Misao Sasaki Primordial black holes from nonperturbative non-Gaussian tails 11:30-12:30 RAPID TALKS Session #2
Lunch Break
12:40-13:50 (various locations)Lunch Break
12:30-14:00 (various locations)Lunch Break
12:30-14:00 (various locations)Lunch Break
12:30-14:00 (various locations)
13:50-15:00 Emanuele Berti Gravitational waves and their sources 15:05-16:00 Alessandra Silvestri Cosmological tests of gravity
14:00-14:30 Gopolang Mohlabeng Searching for dark matter from the laboratory to the cosmos 14:30-14:45 Valerio De Luca A primordial black hole story 14:45-15:00 Tessa Baker Testing cosmological gravity with gravitational waves 15:00-15:30 Hartmut Abele: Gravity resonance spectroscopy, and a search for Lorentz violation, beyond-Riemann and entropic gravity
14:00-14:30 Lia Medeiros New test of the black hole metric with EHT images of Sgr A* 14:30-15:00 Frans Pretorius On the dynamical stability of AdS black bubbles 15:00-15:10 Kiana Salehi Shadow Implications: What does measuring the photon ring imply for gravity 15:10-15:20 Alejandro Cardenas-Avendano Testing general relativity using black hole photon rings 15:20-15:30 Adam Solomon Symmetries of black hole perturbation theory
14:00-14:30 Niayesh Afshordi Precision quantum cosmology 14:30-14:40 Sugumi Kanno Graviton non-gaussianity in ⍺-vacuum 14:40-15:10 Lam Hui Recent developments in black hole perturbation theory 15:10-15:25 Ramin Daghigh Spacetime metrics and ringdown waveforms for galactic black holes surrounded by a dark matter spike 15:25-15:35 Sam Wong The weak gravity conjecture and black hole tidal Love numbers
16:30-17:30 Clifford Will Renaissance of General Relativity
16:00-16:30 Claudia de Rham Causality in the sky 16:30-17:00 Mark Kasevich Testing gravity and quantum mechanics with atom interferometry 17:00-17:10 Chukman So HAICU - developing an antihydrogen fountain interferometer 17:10-18:00 RAPID TALKS Session #1
16:00-16:25 Silke Weinfurtner Primary thermalisation mechanism of early universe observed from Faraday-wave scattering on liquid-liquid interfaces 16:25-16:35 Sam Patrick Superradiance around quantum vortices 16:35-16:45 Benjamin Elder Screened modified gravity and muonium 16:45-16:55 Leah Jenks Aspects of rotating black holes in dynamical Chern-Simons 16:55-17:20 Tanmay Vachaspati Unexciting backgrounds 17:20-17:35 Bill Unruh LIGO shows macroscopic objects are quantum
16:00-16:10 Alice Garoffolo Testing gravity on cosmological scales with gravitational waves 16:10-16:20 Meng-Xiang Lin Gravitational wave propagation beyond General Relativity and its degeneracies with lensing 16:20-16:50 Justin Khoury Our universe at criticality: folding funnels and percolation 16:50-17:00 Levon Pogosian Conference Summary
Registration Open Until 19:00Poster Session and Reception 18:00-20:00 (snacks & cash bar)Conference Dinner
19:00 (Al Porto on Waterfront)
download full conference program or all talk and poster abstracts as PDF files for printingall talks will be held at 1900 Fletcher Challenge Theatre
Registered Participants:
Hartmut Abele (TU Wien)Arefe Abghari (UBC)Eric Adelberger (Washington)Niayesh Afshordi (Perimeter)Brian Allen (Independent Researcher)Tom Andersen (nSCIr)Tessa Baker (Queen Mary London)Jonathan Barenboim (SFU)David Benisty (Leiden)Emanuele Berti (Johns Hopkins)Cliff Burgess (McMaster U & Perimeter)Masroor C. Pookkillath (CTPNP, Mahidol, Thailand)A. Cardenas-Avendano (Princeton)Michael Carlson (Private)Ramiro Cayuso (Perimeter)Maxence Corman (Perimeter)David Cyncynates (Washington)Ramin Daghigh (Metro State)Conner Dailey (Perimeter)Santanu Das (Imperial College London)Valerio De Luca (UPenn)Claudia de Rham (Imperial College)Guillaume Dideron (Waterloo)Benjamin Elder (Hawai'i)Matthew Elley (King's College London)Kye Emond (SFU)Pedro Ferreira (Oxford)Bartolomeo Fiorini (Queen Mary London)Andrei Frolov (SFU)Alice Garoffolo (Leiden)Conner Gettings (Washington)Douglas Gingrich (Alberta/TRIUMF)Ruth Gregory (King's College London)Yuri Gusev (SFU)Shiming Gu (UBC)Ryley Hill (UBC)Joseph Howlett (Stanford)Chayce Hughes (UBC PHAS)Lam Hui (Columbia)Asuka Ito (QUP/KEK)Leah Jenks (Chicago, KICP)Sugumi Kanno (Kyushu)Gregory Kaplanek (Imperial College London)Mark Kasevich (Stanford)Justin Khoury (UPenn)Kurt Koltko (Independent Theoretical Physicist)Kazuya Koyama (Portsmouth)Jordan Krywonos (Perimeter)Gabor Kunstatter (Winnipeg)Qiuyue Liang (UPenn)Meng-Xiang Lin (UPenn)Joshua MacEachern (UBC)Hayley Macpherson (Chicago)Fereshteh Majidi (UBC)Jess McIver (UBC)Lia Medeiros (Institute for Advanced Study)Hamid Mirpoorian (SFU)Gopolang Mohlabeng (UC Irvine)Sotirios Mygdalas (Perimeter)Ann Nakato (Kobe)Ali Nezhadsafavi (SFU)Samaya Nissanke (Amsterdam)Adrian Ottewill (UCD)Zhen Pan (Perimeter)Sam Patrick (King's College London)Will Percival (Waterloo/Perimeter)Levon Pogosian (SFU)Frans Pretorius (Princeton Univ.)G. F. Quispe Pena (SFU)Marco Raveri (Genova)Michael Ross (Washington)Jeremy Sakstein (Hawaii)Kiana Salehi (Perimeter)Marcelo Salgado (Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, UNAM)Misao Sasaki (Kavli IPMU, Tokyo)Jan Schuette-Engel (Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)Bryan Scott (CIERA/Northwestern)Douglas Scott (UBC)Armen Sedrakian (Frankfurt Institute for Advnaced Studies)Michael Seifert (Connecticut College)Ashim Sen Gupta (Queen Mary London)Banafsheh Shiralilou (Amsterdam)Alessandra Silvestri (Leiden)Jiro Soda (Kobe)Adam Solomon (McMaster/Perimeter)Hajime Sotani (RIKEN)Raelyn Sullivan (UBC)Tomoya Tachinami (Hirosaki, Japan)Kate Taylor (Victoria)Andrew Tolley (Imperial)Mark Trodden (UPenn)William Unruh (UBC & Texas A&M)Tanmay Vachaspati (Arizona State)George Wang (UBC)Yunting Wang (UBC)Zhuangfei Wang (SFU)Zach Weiner (Washington)Silke Weinfurtner (Nottingham)Sam Wong (UPenn)Alex Woodfinden (Waterloo)Mohsen Yazdi (Independent Researcher)Luna Zagorac (Perimeter)Jann Zosso (ETHZ/UIUC)Alex Zucca (D-Wave Systems)
All participants, including attendees and organizers, will treat each other with respect and conduct themselves in a professional manner that is welcoming to everyone and free from any form of discrimination, harassment, or retaliation.
While scientific debate is encouraged, discriminatory, harassing, or bullying behaviour or action of any kind will not be tolerated, and will result in immediate removal from this conference. This includes but is not limited to any form of sexual harassment, intimidation, threatening behaviour, sustained disruption, use of offensive or demeaning language including inappropriate jokes, unwanted photography, making statements based on individual characteristics such as age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, nationality, political affiliation, ability status, educational background, or any other characteristic protected by law in British Columbia or Canada.
If you believe that you have been subject to or have witnessed behaviour that violates this code of conduct, please report it immediately to any of the conference organizers.