Imagine the Universe! (2024)

FAQs

Imagine the Universe!? ›

If we were to shrink the Sun down to a grain of sand, then the observable Universe would only be a little over a hundred billion kilometers in radius, containing around 2 sextillion “grains of sand” (stars) strewn across that enormous volume.

If we were to shrink the Sun down to a grain of sand, then the observable Universe would only be a little over a hundred billion kilometers in radius, containing around 2 sextillion “grains of sand” (stars) strewn across that enormous volume.

We will first consider the three most basic types. There are basically three possible shapes to the Universe; a flat Universe (Euclidean or zero curvature), a spherical or closed Universe (positive curvature) or a hyperbolic or open Universe (negative curvature).

The observable universe is a ball-shaped region of the universe consisting of all matter that can be observed from Earth or its space-based telescopes and exploratory probes at the present time; the electromagnetic radiation from these objects has had time to reach the Solar System and Earth since the beginning of the ...

The proper distance—the distance as would be measured at a specific time, including the present—between Earth and the edge of the observable universe is 46 billion light-years (14 billion parsecs), making the diameter of the observable universe about 93 billion light-years (28 billion parsecs).

The most exciting part of asking, “how many universes are there” is that there isn't a concrete answer yet. Multiverses are theoretically possible within our understanding of physics. It's highly unlikely that real alternate universes match most pop culture multiverses.

In astrophysics, there is a curious coincidence involving the angle at which light from distant galaxies is bent due to gravitational lensing. This angle, known as the critical angle, is roughly 42 degrees for a standard cosmological model. The allure of 42 extends to philosophy and the human quest for meaning.

Dark matter is the biggest unsolved mystery of the universe, and it could hold the key to understanding the origin, evolution, and fate of the cosmos. Until we find out what it is, we can only marvel at the dark side of the universe.

Observations from the ground and from space have confirmed thousands of planets beyond our solar system. Our galaxy likely holds trillions. But so far, we have no evidence of life beyond Earth.

The universe, being all there is, is infinitely big and has no edge, so there's no outside to even talk about. Oh, sure, there's an outside to our observable patch of the universe. The cosmos is only so old, and light only travels so fast.

What exists outside the universe? ›

This isn't a question that physics can answer with our present knowledge or without some form of qualification. The trite answer is that both space and time were created at the big bang about 14 billion years ago, so there is nothing beyond the universe.

Outside the bounds of our universe may lie a "super" universe. Space outside space that extends infinitely into what our little bubble of a universe may expand into forever. Lying hundreds of billions of light years from us could be other island universes much like our own.

In the vast, expanding space known as the universe, humans reside on a small, rocky planet called Earth. Our planet is part of a discrete solar system in an arm of the spiral shaped Milky Way Galaxy. Our galaxy is only one of billions of other galaxies that exist within the universe.

After all that, I'll let you in on a secret: even astronomers can't truly grasp these scales. We work with them and we can do the math and physics with them, but our ape brain still struggles to comprehend even the distance to the moon—and the universe is 2 million trillion times bigger than that.

The size of the Universe is difficult to determine because it is constantly expanding. However, current estimates put the observable Universe at around 93 billion light years in diameter.

That is because we can only see as far as light (or more accurately the microwave radiation thrown out from the Big Bang) has travelled since the Universe began. Since the Universe burst into existence an estimated 13.8 billion years ago, it has been expanding outwards ever since.