cosmic microwave background Archives

December 7, 2022December 7, 2022 by Matt Williams

“Early Dark Energy” Could Explain the Crisis in Cosmology

A diagram of the evolution of the observable universe. The Dark Ages are the object of study in this new research, and were preceded by the CMB, or Afterglow Light Pattern. By NASA/WMAP Science Team - Original version: NASA; modified by Cherkash, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11885244 — A diagram of the evolution of the observable universe. Credit: NASA/WMAP/Wikimedia

In 1916, Einstein finished his Theory of General Relativity, which describes how gravitational forces alter the curvature of spacetime. Among other things, this theory predicted that the Universe is expanding, which was confirmed by the observations of Edwin Hubble in 1929. Since then, astronomers have looked farther into space (and hence, back in time) to measure how fast the Universe is expanding – aka. the Hubble Constant. These measurements have become increasingly accurate thanks to the discovery of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) and observatories like the Hubble Space Telescope.

Astronomers have traditionally done this in two ways: directly measuring it locally (using variable stars and supernovae) and indirectly based on redshift measurements of the CMB and cosmological models. Unfortunately, these two methods have produced different values over the past decade. As a result, astronomers have been looking for a possible solution to this problem, known as the “Hubble Tension.” According to a new paper by a team of astrophysicists, the existence of “Early Dark Energy” may be the solution cosmologists have been looking for.

November 20, 2022November 20, 2022 by Laurence Tognetti

Scroll Through the Universe with This Cool Interactive Map

Expansion of the Universe (Credit: NASA/WMAP Science Team)

Johns Hopkins University (JHU) continues to pad its space community résumé with their interactive map, “The map of the observable Universe”, that takes viewers on a 13.7-billion-year-old tour of the cosmos from the present to the moments after the Big Bang. While JHU is responsible for creating the site, additional contributions were made by NASA, the European Space Agency, the National Science Foundation, and the Sloan Foundation.

August 3, 2022August 3, 2022 by Brian Koberlein

Astronomers Measure the Signal of Dark Matter From 12 Billion Years ago

Visualization of how dark matter lenses distant light. Credit: Reiko Matsushita (Nagoya University)

Although the particles of dark matter continue to allude us, astronomers continue to find evidence of it. In a recent study, they have seen its effect from the edge of visible space, when the universe was just 1.5 billion years old.

January 26, 2022January 31, 2022 by Matt Williams

Finally, an Explanation for the Cold Spot in the Cosmic Microwave Background

Map of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) sky produced by the Planck satellite. The Cold Spot is shown in the inset, with coordinates and the temperature difference in the scale at the bottom. Credit: ESA/Durham University.

According to our current Cosmological models, the Universe began with a Big Bang roughly 13.8 billion years ago. During the earliest periods, the Universe was permeated by an opaque cloud of hot plasma, preventing atoms from forming. About 380,000 years later, the Universe began to cool and much of the energy generated by the Big Bang converted into light. This afterglow is now visible to astronomers as the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), first observed during the 1960s.

One peculiar characteristic about the CMB that attracted a lot of attention was the tiny fluctuations in temperature, which could provide information about the early Universe. In particular, there is a rather large spot in the CMB that is cooler than the surrounding afterglow, known as the CMB Cold Spot. After decades of studying the CMB’s temperature fluctuations, a team of scientists recently confirmed the existence of the largest cold spots in the CMB afterglow – the Eridanus Supervoid – might be the explanation for the CMB Cold Spot that astronomers have been looking for!

June 21, 2021June 21, 2021 by Andy Tomaswick

Astronomers saw the Same Supernova Three Times Thanks to Gravitational Lensing. And in Twenty Years They Think They’ll see it one More Time

It is hard for humans to wrap their heads around the fact that there are galaxies so far away that the light coming from them can be warped in a way that they actually experience a type of time delay. But that is exactly what is happening with extreme forms of gravitational lensing, such as those that give us the beautiful images of Einstein rings. In fact, the time dilation around some of these galaxies can be so extreme that the light from a single event, such as a supernova, can actually show up on Earth at dramatically different times. That is exactly what a team led by Dr. Steven Rodney at the University of South Carolina and Dr. Gabriel Brammer of the University of Copenhagen has found. Except three copies of this supernova have already appeared – and the team thinks it will show up again one more time, 20 years from now.

March 7, 2021March 7, 2021 by Matt Williams

Nancy Grace Roman Telescope is Getting an Upgraded new Infrared Filter

NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) is now named the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, after NASA’s first Chief of Astronomy. Credits: NASA

In 2025, the Nancy Grace Roman space telescope will launch to space. Named in honor of NASA’s first chief astronomer (and the “Mother of Hubble“), the Roman telescope will be the most advanced and powerful observatory ever deployed. With a camera as sensitive as its predecessors, and next-generation surveying capabilities, Roman will have the power of “One-Hundred Hubbles.”

In order to meet its scientific objectives and explore some of the greatest mysteries of the cosmos, Roman will be fitted with a number of infrared filters. But with the decision to add a new near-infrared filter, Roman will exceed its original design and be able to explore 20% of the infrared Universe. This opens the door for exciting new research and discoveries, from the edge of the Solar System to the farthest reaches of space.

November 29, 2020November 29, 2020 by Brian Koberlein

Polarized light from the cosmic background hints at new physics

Visualizing the polarization of the cosmic microwave background. Credit: ESA/Planck Collaboration

The oldest light in the universe is that of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). This remnant glow from the big bang has traveled for more than 13 billion years. Along the way, it has picked up a few tales about the history and evolution of the cosmos. We just need to listen to what it has to say.

August 4, 2020 by Brian Koberlein

The Universe is the Same, Everywhere We Look. Even More than Cosmologists Predicted

Several superclusters revealed by the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey. This contains the structure known as the "Sloan Great Wall". Courtesy 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey.

No matter which direction you look in the Universe, the view is basically the same if you look far enough. Our local neighborhood is populated with bright nebulae, star clusters, and dark clouds of gas and dust. There are more stars toward the center of the Milky Way than there are in other directions. But across millions, and billions, of light-years, galaxies cluster evenly in all directions, and everything starts to look the same. In astronomy, we say the Universe is homogeneous and isotropic. Put another way, the Universe is smooth.

August 3, 2020 by Brian Koberlein

How Loop Quantum Gravity Could Match Anomalies in the CMB with Large Structures in the Modern Universe

Our universe is best described by the LCDM model. That is an expanding universe filled with dark energy (Lambda), and dense clumps of cold dark matter (CDM). It is also sprinkled with regular matter that makes up planets, stars, and us, but that only makes up about 4% of the cosmos. While we don’t know what dark matter and dark energy are, we know how they behave, so the ?CDM model works exceptionally well. There’s just one small problem.

April 29, 2020April 30, 2020 by Brian Koberlein

How Do You Weigh The Universe?

How do you weigh everything in the cosmos? Credit: ESO/T. Preibisch

The weight of the universe (technically the mass of the universe) is a difficult thing to measure. To do it you need to count not just stars and galaxies, but dark matter, diffuse clouds of dust and even wisps of neutral hydrogen in intergalactic space. Astronomers have tried to weigh the universe for more than a century, and they are still finding ways to be more accurate.