OBJECTIVE:  I will be able to relate CMBR to the age of Universe during today's class

WORDS FOR TODAY:

• CMBR ("Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation")

Big Bang Time Line Items (Revised-- The previous items were a bit too clunky. Please make note of these improvements):

10^-43 sec: Planck Time- The farthest back in time we think we'll ever be able to describe with science & math

10^-32 sec: Inflation- The Universe expands *suddenly* faster than the speed of light (still too hot for light)

10^-6 sec: Fundamental particles form(but still too hot for light)

3 min: First helium nuclei (but still too hot for light)

380,000 years: The Universe cools off enough for electrons to get captured to form complete hydrogen and helium atoms. (finally 'cool' engough for light to shine!)

 

These are timeline items you MUST burn into your

WORK O' THE DAY: 

Please work with your group to recap the first 380,000 years (or so)

 

 

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Now let's review our work from yesterday. The general form of the graphic below is helpful:

However THIS form of the Big Bang Timeline is a bit more expressive:

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Let's do a quick recap of how we measured the temperature of the Universe of the last 4 decades:

Here was our first attempt at measuring CMBR:

COBE: COsmic microwave Background Observer - 1989

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Our next attempt:

WMAP: Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (NASA) active from 2001 - 2010 (according to NASA the WMAP probe improved the measurements made by COBE by an astounding 68,000 times).

 

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And then:

The European Space Agency launched the Planck Satellite (2009 - 2013) that collected THIS data

And Now:

HERE's a quick look at how that mapping was achieved

From all of that data, scientists have very, very strong evidence to support the Big Bang Theory.

That theory is so well researched and the evidence is so strong that there is no other scientific theory to explain how the Universe was formed.

From that data we know the temperature of the Universe (2.73 Kelvins (degrees above absolute zero) and the age of the Universe (13.8 billion years)

Now let's jump into the FINE ARTS part of this unit: