Works Cited

Martin S. Silberberg, “Chemistry The Molecular Nature of Matter and Change Fifth Edition”, New York NY 2009

K.A. Olive and G. Steigman, “On the abundance of primordial helium”, Astrophys. J. Suppl. 97 (1995) 49

M.Livio: The Accelerating Universe: Infinite Expansion, the Cosmological Constant, and the Beauty of the Cosmos (Wiley, 2000)

G.J. Mathews, T. Kajino, and T. Shima, Big Bang Nucleosynthesis with a New Neutron Lifetime, Phys. Rev. D71 (2005) 021302 

S.Boughn and R. Crittenden, A correlation between the cosmic microwave background and large-scale structure in the Universe, Nature 427 (2004)

Carl Sagan, “Cosmos” Random House (2002) 

Neil Tyson Degrasse, Most Astounding Fact !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D05ej8u-gU

A Supernova of an Exploding Star 

Supernovae are extremely luminous and cause a burst of radiation that often briefly outshines an entire galaxy, before fading from view over several weeks or months. During this short interval a supernova can radiate as much energy as the sun is expected to emit over its entire life span.Supernovae can be triggered in one of two ways: by the sudden reignition of nuclear fusion in a degenerate star; or by the collapse of the core of a massive star.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernova

Edwin Hubble

An American astronomer who played a crucial role in establishing the field of extragalactic astronomy (November 20, 1889 – September 28, 1953).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Hubble

The Cosmo is all that is or ever was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us - there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries. - Carl Sagan “Cosmos” 

Introduction 

One of the most astounding mysteries i had when i was a kid was how everything, even us, came into existence; this universe housing billions of galaxies each galaxy containing billions of stars, many with orbiting planets making up solar systems. How did it all begin? It is now a popular belief that most scientists agree and known as the Big Bang theory, which sheds light on the mystery of the origin of the universe. 

Why Should We Care?

The human mind was born with curiosity, so we are naturally curious about everything around us, where we come from, and when did it all begin. Although the Big Bang Theory does not answer all the major questions, it is certainly a very possible explanation as to how we got here. The theory helps us understand our place in the cosmos and be grateful that on this speck of dust in the vast universe we have been fortunate enough to live. 

The Large Hadron Collider 

Future Developments and Implications

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the worlds largest and highest-energy particle accelerator built by CERN.The collider is contained in a circular tunnel, with a circumference of 27 kilometers (17 mi), at a depth ranging from 50 to 175 meters (160 to 574 ft) underground, it crosses the border between Switzerland and France at four points. With the aim of allowing physicist to test theories in particle physics this enormous machine accelerates particles at speeds nearly reaching the speed of light with nearly 1,000 dipole magnets propelling them. The particles are accelerated in opposite directions and meet at a certain point where they collide with great force. Such type of collision mimics that of just seconds after the Big Bang, creating a miniature Big Bang surrounded by particle detectors to observe what kind of  subatomic reactions may occur. Physicist hope that the LHC will help answer some of the fundamental questions in physics regarding the deep structure of space and time, and basic laws and interactions between quantum mechanics and general relativity.  

Cosmic Background Radiation 

During the early stages of the Big Bang while immense amount of energy gave raise to the free floating subatomic particles in this still greatly dense sphere, during this time the conditions still did not provide an ideal setting for nuclear fusion of neutral atoms. These charged subunits emitted large amounts of radiation and photon particles (light) which continued until the temperature cooled enough to make neutral atoms which no longer could absorb the thermal radiation emissions. The radiation and photons that existed during this time period began to move freely through space no longer contained within the region and as well expanded throughout our universe. In 1964, two radio astronomers Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson discovered this now uniform thermal radiation accidentally trying to get rid of a constant background “noise” from their radio antenna signals, they later realize that this constant signal was uniform in every direction and that it must have originated far far away, which meant a very long time ago. This detectable form of microwaves was called Cosmic Background Radiation, a much weaker form of radiation due to the lengthening of the wavelength. This radiation is detectable allover the universe and has no correlation with stars, plants or anything else which leads scientist to believe that this is in fact remanence of the early radiation emitted 13.7 billion years ago during the Big Bang. 

Expansion of the Universe

Astronomer Vesto Slipher noticed that there are more galaxies going away from us than approaching us. This was observed by looking at the spectrum of its light. Similar to the Doppler effect on the wavelength (pitch) of sound waves when the source of the sound is moving towards and away. The same can be detected from light waves, this phenomena known as the Red Shift results when a source of light, in this case light from a distant galaxy, has a shift in color due to the distance and speed the object is moving away from sight. In the event of a train moving away from one self, the sound changes its pitch do to the sound-wave stretching to longer wavelength; similarly when a distant illuminating object moves away from us, the visible wavelength stretches to a longer wavelength resulting in the object looking a more reddish color. In 1929, Edwin Hubble discovered that farther galaxies are going away from us at higher speeds, proportional to their distance, in other words if the wavelength had doubled, space must have expanded by a factor of two. Using the red shift method scientists have calculated the approximate age of the universe by seeing that the separation between galaxies gets smaller going back from the expanding universe. This can be traced back to when the distance between galaxies was essentially zero. 

                                                                               http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/uni_expansion.html

What is the Big Bang Theory? 

It was previously believed that the entire universe was the way it always had been “static”, and that it also only consisted of our milky way galaxy, until 1924 when a man named Edwin Hubble discovered that in fact the universe is much vaster then previously thought, with many more galaxies, and also that the universe is not static and is in fact expanding.This discovery along with Einstein's formulation of general relativity, lead to the theory that the universe must have had a point of origin in which it expanded from, thus the birth of the Big Bang Theory was conceived. The big bang theory states that the beginning of the universe began as a infinitesimal small volume with an infinitely high density and temperature, this was known as the “singularity”. This region of energy then began to inflate, expand and cool, dragging along with it the very fabric of space and time carrying all the observable matter we see today. It continues to expand today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang