Galaxy-M31-Andromeda
“We do not ask for what purpose the birds do sing, for song is their pleasure since they were created for singing. Similarly we ought not to ask why the human mind troubles to fathom the secrets of heaven. The diversity of phenomena of Nature is so great, and the treasures hidden in the heavens so rich, precisely to order that the human mind shall never be lacking in fresh nourishment.”…..Johannes Kepler Mysterium Cosmographcum
I entered my kitchen to bake…cake.. For this I needed the ingredients..Flour sugar eggs butter a pinch of this and a pinch of that.. and ofcourse the heat of the oven. The fluffy cake was made of small granules I observed. It consists of even small molecules the molecules are made of atoms I had read in chemistry. The elements present in our body except Hydrogen, the atoms eg carbon hydrogen oxygen etc are made in Star billions of years ago. Isn’t it exciting? Everything you me and the matter present in this world are made of atoms-molecules from the womb of the Stars…….
A Star is like a cosmic kitchen where atoms are cooked from hydrogen to helium to more heavier atoms. The Astrophysicists say that all the matter in the Universe – in people plants and animals in the planets and in the stars –galaxies were created 13 billion years ago. I remember Carl Sagan’s words “Something in us recognizes Cosmos as home. We are made of stellar ash. Our origin and evolution have been tied to distant cosmic event The exploration of Cosmos is a voyage of self- discovery.
With renewed fervor I started to study this Discovery ... The Origin of our Universe.
THE BIG BANG;-
It is approximated that about 10 to15 billion years ago there was a huge explosion in a tiny dense point, this created Time Space Matter and Energy. This titanic cosmic explosion was called The Big Bang by the Scientists. The Big Bang was like no other explosion you might witness on earth today. The Cosmologist believe that the Big Bang flung energy in all directions at the speed of light (300,000,000) meters per second, a hundred thousand times faster than the hydrogen bomb. The temperature was 1000 trillion degree Celsius at just a fraction of second after the explosion. Even the cores of the hottest star in today’s universe are much cooler.
The concept of the Big Bang grew out of steady accumulation of evidences gathered from both theoretical and observational research throughout the course of 20th century. Some of the considerations are as follows:
1)THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE:
100 Years ago Albert Einstein published three papers that rocked the world. One of his papers for equation for Relativity, indicated that the universe was expanding. Einsteins Theory inspired many scientists – Willem de Sitter in Holland and Alexendr Friedmann of Russia.
In 1929 the Astronomer Edwin Hubble showed that the furtherest galaxies were fleeing away from each other. By studying their electromagnetic spectrum the scientist can determine if an object is moving away from the earth or towards the earth. The spectrum of distant objects like quasars is shifted to Red. The light given off by them have longer wave length. While the spectrum of light from the objects coming towards earth have shorter wave length, and shifted towards violet.
In the winters of 1998 in Berkeley California, a team of scientist made similar startling discovery about the fast expanding Universe. -- The Supernovae-exploding stars visible over great distance s. “This has shaken Astronomy to its core” (Astronomy October 1999).
A DAY WITHOUT YESTERDAY
A Belgium Mathematian George Lemaitre and Catholic priest (1894-1966) had developed the theory of the Big Bang . Lemaitre came to be known as “Father of The Big Bang” described the beginning of Universe as a burst of fireworks comparing galaxies to the burning embers spreading from the centre of the burst. He believed that the burst of fireworks was the beginning of Time taking place on “a day without yesterday.”
Another theory which supported this Origin of Universe by detecting hot radiations in the Cosmos called CMB.
2)THE COSMIC MICROWAVE BACKGROUND RADIATION;-
In 1965 two young radio astronomers Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson almost accidentally discovered Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) Radiation using a small calibrated horn antenna. they couldn’t eliminate a bothersome source of noise . They picked up this noise everywhere they pointed the antenna. At first they thought it was bird droppings. The antenna was so sensitive that it could pick up the heat of bird droppings. But even after cleaning it off they picked up this noise. This noise was actually predicted years earlier by George Gamow a Russian-American Physicist as a relic of the evolution of the early universe. This background of microwave s was in fact the cooled remnants of the primeval fireball – an echo of Big Bang!
Although science may solve the problem of how the Universe began, it cannot answer why does the Universe exists at all!
My above article got published in the Hitavada on 28/11/2010
...............................................................................................................................................................................................................
I entered my kitchen to bake…cake.. For this I needed the ingredients..Flour sugar eggs butter a pinch of this and a pinch of that.. and ofcourse the heat of the oven. The fluffy cake was made of small granules I observed. It consists of even small molecules the molecules are made of atoms I had read in chemistry. The elements present in our body except Hydrogen, the atoms eg carbon hydrogen oxygen etc are made in Star billions of years ago. Isn’t it exciting? Everything you me and the matter present in this world are made of atoms-molecules from the womb of the Stars…….
A Star is like a cosmic kitchen where atoms are cooked from hydrogen to helium to more heavier atoms. The Astrophysicists say that all the matter in the Universe – in people plants and animals in the planets and in the stars –galaxies were created 13 billion years ago. I remember Carl Sagan’s words “Something in us recognizes Cosmos as home. We are made of stellar ash. Our origin and evolution have been tied to distant cosmic event The exploration of Cosmos is a voyage of self- discovery.
With renewed fervor I started to study this Discovery ... The Origin of our Universe.
THE BIG BANG;-
It is approximated that about 10 to15 billion years ago there was a huge explosion in a tiny dense point, this created Time Space Matter and Energy. This titanic cosmic explosion was called The Big Bang by the Scientists. The Big Bang was like no other explosion you might witness on earth today. The Cosmologist believe that the Big Bang flung energy in all directions at the speed of light (300,000,000) meters per second, a hundred thousand times faster than the hydrogen bomb. The temperature was 1000 trillion degree Celsius at just a fraction of second after the explosion. Even the cores of the hottest star in today’s universe are much cooler.
The concept of the Big Bang grew out of steady accumulation of evidences gathered from both theoretical and observational research throughout the course of 20th century. Some of the considerations are as follows:
1)THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE:
100 Years ago Albert Einstein published three papers that rocked the world. One of his papers for equation for Relativity, indicated that the universe was expanding. Einsteins Theory inspired many scientists – Willem de Sitter in Holland and Alexendr Friedmann of Russia.
In 1929 the Astronomer Edwin Hubble showed that the furtherest galaxies were fleeing away from each other. By studying their electromagnetic spectrum the scientist can determine if an object is moving away from the earth or towards the earth. The spectrum of distant objects like quasars is shifted to Red. The light given off by them have longer wave length. While the spectrum of light from the objects coming towards earth have shorter wave length, and shifted towards violet.
In the winters of 1998 in Berkeley California, a team of scientist made similar startling discovery about the fast expanding Universe. -- The Supernovae-exploding stars visible over great distance s. “This has shaken Astronomy to its core” (Astronomy October 1999).
A DAY WITHOUT YESTERDAY
A Belgium Mathematian George Lemaitre and Catholic priest (1894-1966) had developed the theory of the Big Bang . Lemaitre came to be known as “Father of The Big Bang” described the beginning of Universe as a burst of fireworks comparing galaxies to the burning embers spreading from the centre of the burst. He believed that the burst of fireworks was the beginning of Time taking place on “a day without yesterday.”
Another theory which supported this Origin of Universe by detecting hot radiations in the Cosmos called CMB.
2)THE COSMIC MICROWAVE BACKGROUND RADIATION;-
In 1965 two young radio astronomers Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson almost accidentally discovered Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) Radiation using a small calibrated horn antenna. they couldn’t eliminate a bothersome source of noise . They picked up this noise everywhere they pointed the antenna. At first they thought it was bird droppings. The antenna was so sensitive that it could pick up the heat of bird droppings. But even after cleaning it off they picked up this noise. This noise was actually predicted years earlier by George Gamow a Russian-American Physicist as a relic of the evolution of the early universe. This background of microwave s was in fact the cooled remnants of the primeval fireball – an echo of Big Bang!
Although science may solve the problem of how the Universe began, it cannot answer why does the Universe exists at all!
My above article got published in the Hitavada on 28/11/2010
...............................................................................................................................................................................................................
