Our View Of The Universe

The universe began with the big bang, and for the first four hundred thousand years all matter was ionised, indicated by the blue region in the diagram. When the universe had cooled enough to allow atoms to form, there followed a period known as the dark ages, during which matter condensed into the first stars and galaxies. After 150 million years the first stars ignited and began to emit visible light. The grey circle marks this time when the first galaxies can be seen.

The white circle represents the spacial dimensions of the universe. As time passes, the circumference of the circle increases, corresponding to the expansion of the universe. Time is represented by the radius of the circle, and travel through space is represented by rotation around the circle. For simplicity, only one spacial dimension is shown in the diagram, but the remaining two dimensions behave in the same way. Matter remains almost stationary on the circle, but light rotates around the circle at a constant angular velocity. The location of our solar system is indicated by the green dot.

To examine our view of the universe, lets zoom in to our region, and start from time zero. The blue dot is a supernova explosion that occurred around the time of the first galaxies, and is visible to us today. The light from the supernova explosion propagates in all directions, and its wavelength is gradually shifted towards the red end of the spectrum as the universe expands. It is not visible to us until the light arrives at the Earth at the present time. The only section of the universe visible to us today is along this light path. However, this does give us a representative cross-section of the universe all the way back to the big bang.

We can see how the view of the universe from our solar system evolves with time, by restarting again from time zero. The light curves show the cross-section of the universe that is visible at any time. Notice the intersection of the light curves with the time of the first galaxies. As the age of the universe increases, the first visible galaxies continually change as new galaxies come within range of our solar system.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• universe
• cosmology
• big
• bang
• space
• time
• matter
• light

[Ignare]

One day, I'll show that video to my students. It's an important piece of information. Thx for creating it.

[imitokay]

this is in teh wrong place, sorry, u can bury it with thumbs down

[faithfulbeliever33]

Big bangs, or explosions do not create balances. They do the exact opposite. They create disarray and disorganization. They do not create intelligent life nor does it evolve.This video is so far from the truth and was created by someone who does not believe in GOD.

[darkcloud0987654321]

why do you sound like a robot?

[L00NGB00W]

@thembones12

You're going to be dissapointed. Some of your questions cannot be answered...

"HOW big was the particle"

Infinitely small. A point.

"WHERE DID PARTICLE CAME FROM?"[sic]

Nobody knows.

"WHO MADE IT?"

Nobody. A better question to ask would be... WHAT CAUSED IT?

I say nobody, because people won't have evolved for another 14,399,000,000 years or so.

Cheers!

[L00NGB00W]

@Machete964

" And what was there before the universe"

No one knows...

"How big actually is the universe"

Well, it's been expanding for 14,400,000,000 years... If we assume the expansion is at the speed of light, then the diameter of the universe is 28,800,000,000 Light years

It's current total volume is (calculator breaks) 2.19x10³² Cubic Light years.

(That's 219,000,000,000,000,000,000,00­0,000,000,000 LY³)

[Machete964]

And what was there before the universe that created the big bang?

How big actually is the universe, everything has to have an end...

[thembones12]

In the beginning there was nothing at time zero!

Then there was a small particle ... then big bang?

HOW big was the particle when the big bang started?

AND WHERE DID PARTICLE CAME FROM?

WHO MADE IT?

For all those smart people out there, please answer my questions.

[LIVEETERNALLOVE]

yep, by definition, the big bang was not the beginning of existence.

[LIVEETERNALLOVE]

what was before the universe? what's on the outside of the expansion? what was the Source of the bang?

[Pichounator]

Hermmm; you sound like a sock puppet...

[secret212000]

your dumb... that's as polite as I am going to get after seeing such a stupid comment.