In my world, inflation ALWAYS precedes a big bang, yeeeeeehaawwwww!
Posted on 03/16/2006 11:31:54 AM PST by The_Victor
Physicists announced Thursday that they now have the smoking gun that shows the universe went through extremely rapid expansion in the moments after the big bang, growing from the size of a marble to a volume larger than all of observable space in less than a trillion-trillionth of a second.
The discovery — which involves an analysis of variations in the brightness of microwave radiation — is the first direct evidence to support the two-decade-old theory that the universe went through what is called inflation.
It also helps explain how matter eventually clumped together into planets, stars and galaxies in a universe that began as a remarkably smooth, superhot soup.
"It's giving us our first clues about how inflation took place," said Michael Turner, assistant director for mathematics and physical sciences at the National Science Foundation. "This is absolutely amazing."
Brian Greene, a Columbia University physicist, said: "The observations are spectacular and the conclusions are stunning."
Researchers found the evidence for inflation by looking at a faint glow that permeates the universe. That glow, known as the cosmic microwave background, was produced when the universe was about 300,000 years old — long after inflation had done its work.
But just as a fossil tells a paleontologist about long-extinct life, the pattern of light in the cosmic microwave background offers clues about what came before it. Of specific interest to physicists are subtle brightness variations that give images of the microwave background a lumpy appearance.
Physicists presented new measurements of those variations during a news conference at Princeton University. The measurements were made by a spaceborne instrument called the Wilkinson Microwave Anistropy Probe, or WMAP, launched by NASA in 2001.
Earlier studies of WMAP data have determined that the universe is 13.7 billion years old, give or take a few hundred thousand years. WMAP also measured variations in the cosmic microwave background so huge that they stretch across the entire sky. Those earlier observations are strong indicators of inflation, but no smoking gun, said Turner, who was not involved in the research.
The new analysis looked at variations in the microwave background over smaller patches of sky — only billions of light-years across, instead of hundreds of billions.
Without inflation, the brightness variations over small patches of the sky would be the same as those observed over larger areas of the heavens. But the researchers found considerable differences in the brightness variations.
"The data favors inflation," said Charles Bennett, a Johns Hopkins University physicist who announced the discovery. He was joined by two Princeton colleagues, Lyman Page and David Spergel, who also contributed to the research.
Bennett added: "It amazes me that we can say anything at all about what transpired in the first trillionth of a second of the universe."
The physicists said small lumps in the microwave background began during inflation. Those lumps eventually coalesced into stars, galaxies and planets.
The measurements are scheduled to be published in a future issue of the Astrophysical Journal.
I think the experiment you refer to is a demonstration of black surfaces and heat reflection not photon energy/mass but I could be wrong..was once.......
"No, it's really the space expanding."
So, space is a "thing"? A "grid" of sorts?
Michelson & Morely would NOT be pleased...
So, because space time is itself expanding, it is not subject to any speed of light "speed limit?"
p
Actually, the data should be available to anyone if he wants to take a crack at interpreting. I think there is plenty of room for theorizing. I don't find it at all satisfactory to be an insignificant particle of condensation of a former microscopic quantum fluctuation. There is room for improvement.
Good stuff. :-)
Precisely. Space-time is not an object like a photon or a spacecraft. Light speed limitation do not affect it.
Einstein would. He's the one who came up with the concept of space-time, IIRC.
Cool.
Thanks.
We're sorry. Your question is invalid as it was asked without the benefit of a multi-million dollar U.S. Federal Government research grant and, therefore, will not be considered.
Also, it is a "common sense" question and falls short of the sort of arcane, myopic thinking inherent in modern scientific circles. This how it works: We look for what we want. If we find it we immediately proclaim our pre-determined theory to be "truth".
Please step away from your computer. We're in charge here.
They're still upset about not being able to measure the ether.
A soup?.. What is the bowl?.. How big is the bowl?..
Is the bowl growing?.. If the universe is expanding, what is it expanding into?.. and metaphorically what does the bowl rest on?..
"and metaphorically what does the bowl rest on?.."
Turtles. It's turtles all the way down.
Yes, but also Einstein came up with general relativity, and the concept that values are relational.
Einstein wouldn't be pleased with a REAL fixed grid. It would mean that everything's not relative each to the other thing, but relative only to the grid.
Of course, if there really is a fixed grid, it would explain why the frenetic search for the "gravitron", which makes no sense in a truly relativistic Einsteinian universe that has no ether, but makes sense if it's the thing that grabs onto the fixed grid and "warps" it.
Meaningless question! It's probably better expressed by saying that everything got farther away from everything else really fast.
I've seeen those, but I was never really certain how they worked.
So you're claiming light has weight?
No, things traveling through space are restricted to the speed of light. Space itself can go as fast as it wants.
It's not really accurate to say that the universe expanded at speed xyz, its more accurate to say that two points on the surface of the 'marble' had extra space put between them so that it appears that they are receeding at that speed.
"They're still upset about not being able to measure the ether."
Bingo.
They proved there's no "ether".
But if the space-time grid's real, and a real background fixed grid (if expanding) to be warped, then by gum there IS an ether, of sorts, after all. And what's more, there's specific relativity of one thing to another, but relativity is not general: there is a fixed and absolute reference point, the grid.
Einstein would not be pleased.
I like an explanation Physicist posted a while back:
"The problem is that the expanding universe is typically visualized as something like a stretching rubber sheet, or a raisin-laden plum pudding expanding as it bakes. The problem is that these are physical objects that exist in--and take up--some region of space. Over time, these growing objects take up more space, leaving less space for other objects, and either displacing those objects or reaching the limits of the available space. Once the plum pudding fills the oven, there's a problem."The expansion of the universe isn't like that. The universe is not an object; it doesn't "take up space". It is space. As it grows, it doesn't mean that there is less space for objects; it means there is more space for objects. Nothing needs to be displaced to admit its expansion." --Physicist
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