Cosmic string

Cosmic strings are hypothetical 1-dimensional topological defects which may have formed during a symmetry-breaking phase transition in the early universe when the topology of the vacuum manifold associated to this symmetry breaking was not simply connected. In less formal terms, they are hypothetical long, thin defects in the fabric of space. They might have formed in the early universe during a process where certain symmetries were broken. Their existence was first contemplated by the theoretical physicist Tom Kibble in the 1970s. The formation of cosmic strings is somewhat analogous to the imperfections that form between crystal grains in solidifying liquids, or the cracks that form when water freezes into ice. The phase transitions leading to the production of cosmic strings are likely to have occurred during the earliest moments of the universe's evolution, just after cosmological inflation, and are a fairly generic prediction in both quantum field theory and string theory models of the early universe.