Origin of

the



Universe
How Everything Started
The Solar System
 The Goldilocks Planet
 How It Will End
 Points to Ponder
How It All Started: Two
Theories
 Steady State:

 The Universe has always been

and always will be
 Inflationary -- Big Bang
 The Universe started in one
vast explosion from an
infinitely small point
(singularity)
History of the Big Bang
Theory
 1915: Einstein formulates field
equations describing space-time;
arrives at a steady-state solution
 1920s: Alexander Friedmann
finds error in Einstein’s solution;
Georges Lemaître proposes
expanding universe (“cosmic
egg”)
 1929: Edwin Hubble discovers
galaxies are moving away from
each other
 The farther away a galaxy, the
faster it moves
History of the Big
Bang
 1940s: George Gamow presents
theory that universe started from a
dense, hot state; theorizes that
radiation from the big bang should
still exist
 1965: Arno Penzias and Robert
Wilson detects by accident this
leftover radiation
 1970s: Alan Guth formulates
currently accepted Inflationary
Theory
The Big Bang
 Not quite an explosion, but a vast
sudden expansion of space
 No such thing as time before the Big
Bang; descriptions start at 10-43 s after
the event
 Between 10-35 and 10-32, universe
expands in size by 1050
 At 10-4 s, temperature is 1012°K, still no
such thing yet as matter as we know it
 At 3 minutes after the Big Bang, things
cool down enough to form atomic
nuclei
 Elements, matter form a much, much
Stars
 Form from gravitational
accumulation and accretion of
space debris (from old stars)
 Main source of energy: fusion
of hydrogen into helium under
high pressure at star’s core
 Larger stars have more mass,
higher core pressure ⇒ burn
brighter, burn out sooner
 http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~frei/Gcat_htm/Sub_sel/gal_4731.htm

Galaxies
 Hundreds of
billions of
stars, drawn
together by
gravity
 Estimated
number:
several
hundred billion

http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~frei/Gcat_htm/Catalog/CJpeg/n3031.jpg http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~frei/Gcat_htm/Sub_sel/gal_4254.htm
Star Trivia
 Nearest Star: Proxima Centauri
(4.2 light years away)
 No. of stars visible to naked
eye in a typical sky: about 2
thousand, much fewer in
Manila
 No. of stars in universe: 1022
 Percentage of double or
More Trivia
 Age of the Universe: ~14 B
years
 Age of the Milky Way: ~200 MY
younger than Universe
 Q. What’s at the edge of the
Universe? A. There is no edge;
space curves back on itself
 Stardust: Every atom in your
body are remains of burned-out
The Solar System
 Sun – average-
sized star near
edge of Milky
Way Galaxy
 Planets – form
with stars from
space debris, but
with much less
mass
Planet Trivia
 Age of the solar system: ~4.6 B yrs
 Distance to the Moon: 382,500 km
 Distance to Mars: 160 M km
 Distance to Pluto: 3.5 B km
 Planets with rings: Jupiter, Uranus,
Neptune, and yes, Saturn
 No. of known extrasolar planets: 248
(as of 1 Aug 07 in
http://exoplanet.eu)
 No. of planets in our solar system: 8,
after Pluto’s demotion
Q. Why don’t planets crash into
each other, or into the sun?

A. They do, though not as often

as they used to.
Earth: the Goldilocks
Planet
 Just right distance from the sun; not too
warm and not too cold
 Just enough for liquid water to exist
 Rotates on its axis (like a lechon) to
cause even heating of the surface
 Axis tilted only slightly to cause
seasons; too much tilt will burn up one
side while the other side freezes
 Just big enough to hold an atmosphere,
but not too big to attract too many
comets and asteroids
The End of the Universe
Two Possibilities
 Big Crunch
 Universe stops expanding, starts
contracting due to gravity
 Possible if universe has enough mass
(Dark Matter)
 After the crunch, a new Big Bang?
 An oscillating universe?
 Maximum entropy
 All radiation and matter evenly
spread out
 No more energy available to create
stars
Points to
Ponder Drake Equation:
Are we alone? N = R* × fp × ne × fl × fi × fc × L
N = number of
civilizations within
communication
range
R* = rate of star
formation
fp = fraction with
planets
ne = number of those
planets that can
support life
fl = fraction of the
above that actually
have life
fi = fraction of the
above with
intelligent life
fc = fraction of the
Points to
Ponder
 All an
Accident?
 Points to
Ponder
All an
Accident?
 Just six numbers
define the
properties of the
universe (Rees
1999)
 If those numbers
changed in value
by a few percent,
there would be no
stars, no sun, no
earth, no life as
we know it