Tag Archives: dark matter

The BOSS Does A Speed Check.

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The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) has just completed the most accurate speed check of the early Universe.

The baryon acoustic oscillation imprint a fixed scale in the universe just 300,000 years after the Big Bang (shown as white circles). These ripples in the density of matter even remain today in the distribution of galaxies and BOSS is designed to measure the size of these ripples better than any other existing survey.

The measurements show that the early Universe was expanding about 1% every 44 million years.  Although that doesn’t seem like much, I can tell you from my own, personal, expansion of 1% over the last 10 years or so that it adds up (dang, I need to diet again)!

Baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) refers to regular, periodic fluctuations in the density of the visible baryonic matter (a composite subatomic particle made up of three quarks) of the universe. BAO matter is used as a “standard ruler” for determining lengths in cosmology.  The length of this standard ruler (~490 million light years in today’s universe) is measured by looking at the large scale structure of matter using astronomical surveys.

Average Speed Formula

 

Whew, in other words, scientists can measure the distances from the early Universe to today.  Once you know the distances, and the time, you have the speed.  Simple right?

So why is this important?  It turns out that at the beginning dark matter was pushing everything apart, but now dark energy is moving everything apart.  By finding out when/why this happened, scientists may be closer to finding out exactly what they both are and how to measure/detect/observe them both.  By the way, that little sliver of atomic matter is every star, planet, asteroid, meteor and dust particle in the Universe.

– Ex astris, scientia –

I am and avid amateur astronomer and intellectual property attorney in Pasadena, California and I am a Rising Star as rated by Super Lawyers Magazine.  As a former Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy, I am a proud member of the Armed Service Committee of the Los Angeles County Bar Association working to aid all active duty and veterans in our communities. Connect with me on Google +

Norman

NASA – We Found The Fat One!

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El Gordo, the fat one, was finally captured by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.

Hubble image of the most massive cluster of galaxies ever seen to exist

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and J. Jee (University of California, Davis)

A galaxy cluster skirting the edge of the Universe 9.7 billion light-years away, El Gordo has attempted to evade capture, measurement and having its mug shot taken since it was first detected in January 2012.

Authorities at NASA credit the capture to a variety of informants including Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope array in Paranal, Chile.

Due to El Gordo’s massive weight, about 3 million billion times the mass of our sun, it couldn’t escape scientific detectives for long.  By measuring how much El Gordo’s gravity warps images of galaxies in the distant background, a team of astronomical flatfoots calculated the cluster’s mass.

But El Gordo isn’t a solo act.  Science gumshoes had information that  El Gordo was the result of a titanic collision between a pair of galaxy clusters — an event described as two cosmic cannonballs hitting each other.

So this is the end for El Gordo…for now.  Strange occurrences in the area have detectives ever vigilant for more clues to find the big bosses, the king pins of cosmic crimes against the Universe…dark matter and dark energy.  Stay tuned.

– Ex astris, scientia –

I am and avid amateur astronomer and intellectual property attorney in Pasadena, California and I am a Rising Star as rated by Super Lawyers Magazine.  As a former Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy, I am a proud member of the Armed Service Committee of the Los Angeles County Bar Association working to aid all active duty and veterans in our communities. Connect with me on Google +

Norman

Move Over Internet, There’s A Cosmic Web In Town!

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Cosmologist theorize that galaxies are embedded in a cosmic web of “stuff”, and that most of the “stuff” is dark matter.

Cosmic web of filaments

Using a quasar as a sort of cosmic flashlight, astronomers have taken an image of this Web, confirming parts of the theory.  Cosmological calculations showed that as the Universe grows, matter becomes clustered in filaments and nodes under the force of gravity, like a giant cosmic web.

Using the 10-metre Keck telescope in Hawaii, astronomers took the first images of these web filaments.

It is very interesting to look at the similarities of our man made web with the structures made in nature.

So now another piece of the dark matter/dark energy puzzle is in place.  Eventually, we may find the remaining 90% of the Universe.  But, baby steps for now.

 

– Ex astris, scientia –

I am and avid amateur astronomer and intellectual property attorney in Pasadena, California and I am a Rising Star as rated by Super Lawyers Magazine.  As a former Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy, I am a proud member of the Armed Service Committee of the Los Angeles County Bar Association working to aid all active duty and veterans in our communities. Connect with me on Google +

Norman