What is your name, affiliation, academic position, and job title?
My name is Ebrahim Yusofi Rameneti (known as E. Yusofi in articles). Associated Professor of physics at Islamic Azad University (IAU), Ayatollah Amoli Branch, Amol (since 2007 to Jan 2025), and Researcher at Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences (IPM), School of Astronomy (SoA), Tehran (since 2015 to now), Iran.

What is your journey? (Where did you live, learn and work?)
I am originally from Babol, a city in Mazandaran Province. I obtained my PhD in 2014 from the Science and Research Branch of the Islamic Azad University in Tehran. I have served as a faculty member at the Ayatollah Amoli Branch in Amol and worked as a resident researcher at the School of Astronomy (SoA) at the Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences (IPM) from November 2015 to March 2018. Currently, I am actively involved in scientific and research collaborations with SoA/IPM.

What is your field of research and/or what project are you involved in?
Since obtaining my PhD in 2014, My research has focused primarily on two main areas: the first involves early cosmology and cosmic inflation, where I have worked on non-standard initial vacuum states. Since 2017, I have been researching what I am most passionate about: finding a possible physical source for dark energy and the accelerating universe. This project has resulted in several publications in prestigious international journals, including “MNRASL 2022”. The paper “Surface tension of cosmic voids as a possible source for dark energy” gained significant social media traction.

What are your research plans?
The main research plan focuses on identifying the physical source to address the dark energy problem. It comprises two interconnected parts: (1) cosmology research centered on voids, their mergers, and their expansion as drivers of universe expansion, and (2) The modified uncertainty principle in which I have introduced the scale-dependent cosmological constant. The effect of this uncertainty principle involving the cosmological constant in high-energy physics and cosmology could be very crucial.

How does CosmoVerse fit within those plans?
CosmoVerse significantly contributes to progress in cosmology by uniting experts in observation, data analysis, and fundamental physics. I can use observations and data analysis to validate my proposed theoretical void-based model.

Which of your skills are you most proud of, or find most useful?
My research method and skill may be unique and a bit strange among physicists because I first carefully observe and examine the specific behaviors of the scientific topic in similar natural processes and compare them with the behaviors of the system in question. For example, to study the inflationary (accelerating) expansion of the universe, I first carefully observed the behavior of hot milk suddenly spilling from a container (2010). I believe that careful observation of natural processes can be used both as a guiding model for understanding and teaching cosmology and as a guide to possible answers to some of the tensions and unresolved issues in cosmology. This skill and method is especially useful in cosmology because we do not have access to laboratories to test the behavior of the universe and can only model the universe from similar behaviors in nature.

What new skills would you like to learn in the next year?
The ability to identify and engage with suitable and relevant international scientific collaborators.

What are the most exciting open questions in your research area?
Cosmic tensions, particularly the Hubble tension and the accelerating expansion of the universe, along with the nature of dark energy, represent cosmology’s most complex mysteries—and arguably, science’s most exciting challenges. But more fundamental than all of this is the cosmological constant problem, the solution of which seems to resolve many of the problems and tensions in cosmology.

What advances or new results are you excited about or looking forward to?
The discovery of dark energy on the one hand and its relationship to my proposed model.

What is your view on cosmic tensions? How does your work connect with this open question in the community?
Cosmic tensions, particularly the Hubble tension, have gained significant recognition among researchers. Their connection to cosmological problems, dark matter, dark energy, and particularly the cosmological constant problem, is substantial. In my view, addressing the evolving cosmological constant (dark energy) could theoretically resolve many of these issues.

In your career so far, at what point were you the most excited, and what were you excited about?
The greatest excitement arises when observations validate long-held theories proposed by scientists. A prime example of this occurred in 2015 when the LIGO team confirmed the existence of gravitational waves, as predicted by Einstein.

What is the biggest obstacle that is slowing down your research field right now?
The foremost challenge I face is the difficulty in observing phenomena at cosmic scales. Currently, we have only been able to observe and prob astrophysical and local scales. However, there is hope that we will gain access to larger scales of the universe and uncover indications of the potential role of voids in the expansion and evolution of the cosmos. Additionally, I am encountering significant challenges in the mathematical formulation of my model and have not found many collaborators for support.

What role do you think a community network like CosmoVerse can play in developing theoretical astroparticle physics and cosmology?
I believe that, since cosmology encompasses the study of the entire universe, fostering social communication and discussion among researchers across various scientific disciplines can significantly contribute to addressing these fundamental problems in science.

Who is your favourite scientist?
Einstein’s method of learning and researching science is my favorite.

What non-physics interests do you have and want to share?
Psychology, and Philosophy. I am interested in morning exercise, singing in the lap of nature, and also writing poetry.

If you were not a scientist, what do you think you would be doing?
While I may not be a scientist in the traditional sense, I aspire to always remain a researcher, provided of course that my financial situation allows it.

What do you hope to see accomplished scientifically in the next 50 years?
Scientific growth in the world is accelerating, like the accelerating expansion of the universe, and is not very predictable. Many of these cosmic tensions may be answered even within the next ten years.

In your view, what’s the most important challenge that humanity faces currently?
The most significant challenge facing humanity is the improper conduct and misuse of power by certain individuals. As a result, humanity’s greatest enemy and challenge stems from its own unscientific behavior.

What question would you have liked us to ask you, and what would you have answered?
My question is: Is artificial intelligence good or bad, and can it replace natural intelligence?
My answer is that artificial intelligence is inherently beneficial because its capacity for processing vast amounts of data and conducting rapid analyses makes it invaluable for answering questions and serving humanity. However, if artificial intelligence is trained on inaccurate data or used improperly, it can yield harmful results. Therefore, natural intelligence remains more powerful than artificial intelligence, steering its behavior and outcomes. Of course, I actually answered this question myself, I didn’t ask for help from artificial intelligence😅.