Big Bang

Why Finding The First Stars In Our Universe Puts Us Closer To The Big Bang

Anonymous — Mon, 12 Mar 2018 19:28:38 +0000

Why Finding The First Stars In Our Universe Puts Us Closer To The Big Bang Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 03/12/2018 - 13:28

Nell London

From Colorado Public Radio: Astronomers have detected the first stars ever to shine in the universe, an event that happened more than 13 billion years ago. No one’s actually seen them -- scientists picked up their radio waves. But Doug Duncan, director emeritus of the Fiske Planetarium in �鶹ӰԺ, says the discovery may be the most significant find in astronomy since gravitational waves. Scientists want to understand our universe and how it formed from the earliest time, and this puts us incredibly close to the very beginning - the Big Bang.

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Astronomers Use Radio Waves to Look Back at First Stars in the Universe

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Mar 2018 19:50:17 +0000

Astronomers Use Radio Waves to Look Back at First Stars in the Universe Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 03/02/2018 - 12:50

Annika Cline

From KJZZ 91.5 Radio: The story of the universe as we know it and the planet we live on begins with the first star. In 2016, the Hubble Telescope measured the oldest known galaxy in the universe — one that formed 400 million years after the Big Bang.

A group of astronomers has sliced that record in half with new findings that suggest the oldest stars formed 180 million years after the Big Bang. The study is a collaboration between ASU and MIT and was published this week in the journal Nature.

Dr. Judd Bowman is an astrophysicist at ASU who co-authored the study. And he sort of knows how to travel back in time. “Every telescope is a time machine, so the farther away we look, the farther back in time we see,” Bowman said.

It’s not like a TARDIS or a flying DeLorean, but Bowman works with technology that picks up traces of the distant past — signals in the sky leftover from the universe’s earliest moments. Think about it as the first stars sending a letter to a pen pal that didn’t exist yet. But the letter isn’t so easy to read. Read more and listen to the audio...

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Scientists Find Signal From The First Stars In The Universe In A Monumental Moment For Astronomy

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 15:50:15 +0000

Scientists Find Signal From The First Stars In The Universe In A Monumental Moment For Astronomy Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 02/28/2018 - 08:50

From IFL Science: In a groundbreaking discovery, scientists say they have found a signal from some of the earliest stars in the universe, giving us an unparalleled glimpse into the dawn of the cosmos. The signals originate from hydrogen gas from just 180 million years after the Big Bang, itself 13.8 billion years ago. It suggests that the first generation of stars in the universe formed around this time. A study describing the findings, 12 years in the making, is published in Nature.

"Finding this miniscule signal has opened a new window on the early universe,” Judd Bowman from Arizona State University, the study’s lead author, said in a statement. "Telescopes cannot see far enough to directly image such ancient stars, but we've seen when they turned on in radio waves arriving from space." Read more...

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13.6 Billion Years Later, Astronomers have Found Clues to our Earliest Stars

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 15:45:53 +0000

13.6 Billion Years Later, Astronomers have Found Clues to our Earliest Stars Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 02/28/2018 - 08:45

Rachel Becker

From The Verge: The first observation of the earliest stars in the Universe suggests they were forming about 180 million years after the Big Bang. The radio signal used to make this observation, though indirect, backs up some theoretical models about the evolution of the early Universe.

In the beginning, the Universe was made mainly of gas — mostly hydrogen — and a heavy, mysterious material known as dark matter. Over time, pockets of hydrogen gas collapsed to form the first stars, and there was light. But no one knew when exactly these cosmic lights first turned on, until a team of astronomers picked up a faint radio signal that traveled 13.6 billion years to reach Earth.

The radio signal, described today in the journal Nature, tells us that early stars were already forming 180 million years after the Big Bang. That’s because ultraviolet light from these stars irradiated the hydrogen gas surrounding them, causing a telltale dip in the spectrum of radiowaves detected here on Earth. The signal gives scientists an indirect look into the mysterious period of time when the Universe was still in its infancy. Read more...

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