A brief history of time - Stephan Hawkings.
Einsteins Universe - Nigel Colder
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
2006-12-19 03:30:50
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answer #1
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answered by katz149 3
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Einsteins Universe - Nigel Colder
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
2006-12-19 05:20:36
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answer #2
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answered by Kevin_Mart13 3
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Theory has it that the universe started with a singularity (an infintessimal small point of infinite energy and mass). In the first billionth of a billionth of a fraction of a second, the universe was expanding much more rapidly than it does now. That period is called the "inflationary period" where the universe grew from less than the size of an atomic nucleus to the size of, say, the Earth. After that inflationary period, lasting a tiny fraction of a second, the universe expanded at its normal rate, but that very early growth spurt is one of the reasons the universe is so large today.
For about 300,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe was quite dark, because light was not able to break free of the cosmic "soup" it was in. Light particles (photons) were unable to travel very far before being absorbed by the high energy physics that dominated the early universe. After about 300,000 years, though, atomic hydrogen was able to form, leaving light burst free for the first time. Let there be light - and that light, the echo of the Big Bang, was first detected and measured about 30 years ago. It is known as the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMB). CMB makes up part of the "snow" you see on your TV when it's not tuned to any station.
After a few hundred million years, galaxies first started to form from the cooling expanding hydrogen, helium and lithium. Inside these first galaxies, known as quasars, massive black holes were driving the energy and light output. According to "Top Down Theory", these primordial galaxies eventually evolved into modern day galaxies containing hundreds of billions of stars. The Hubble Space Telescope has detected trillions of galaxies.
Newborn stars in galaxies are surrounded by a cloud of gas and debris from previous generations of exploded stars. This gas and debris tends to clump together to make planets inside these solar nebulae, also referred to as planetary nebulae.
The universe is measured to have been expanding for about 14.5 billion years, which is how we derive the age of the universe. This is not an exact science and could be off by as much as 50%. That still puts our measurments in the ball park enough to say that the universe is billions of years old, and by the same token, billions of light years across.
That was the brief tour. There is much more to be discovered. My favorite reference books are listed below.
2006-12-19 04:48:38
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answer #3
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answered by Anonymous
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The Universe in a Nutshell,
Stephen Hawking
2006-12-19 06:08:07
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answer #4
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answered by fighterace26 3
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