Hi George, I have found new information to aid in man's hopeless quest to understand the Universe. It is flat, with a red stripe down the middle, and is made mostly of quintessence!
THE FLIP SIDE OF THE UNIVERSE
New cosmological observations confirm inflation
Late into the night astronomers Angelica de Oliveira-Costa and Max Tegmark worked to analyze their observations of the cosmic microwave background radiation. The next morning the young wife-and-husband team were due to present what their data revealed about the single most important unknown fact in cosmology: the shape of the universe. Their previous results, from a telescope in Saskatoon, Canada, between 1993 and 1995, had suggested that the universe is flat--the first observations to substantiate a long-held belief among cosmologists.
But intrinsic uncertainties in the measurements made it impossible to be sure. So in 1996 the QMAP team (de Oliveira-Costa, Tegmark and five colleagues from the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., and the University of Pennsylvania) flew instruments on a balloon 100,000 feet (30 kilometers) above Texas and New Mexico. When they finally processed the data--the night before their announcement at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory this past May--the situation looked grim. The Saskatoon and the balloon results were completely different.
Suddenly, however, de Oliveira-Costa realized that Tegmark had accidentally plotted the map upside down. When righted, it matched the Saskatoon data exactly. "That was my most exciting moment as a scientist, when I realized we'd flipped that map," Tegmark says. "It was then I realized, yes, Saskatoon was right. The universe is flat."
The QMAP balloon discerned much finer details in the radiation than the Cosmic Microwave Background Explorer (COBE) satellite did eight years ago. In some areas this radiation is slightly dimmer; in others, brighter (red). The red stripe down the middle represents the Milky Way galaxy, whose own microwave emission overpowers the cosmic signal; to avoid it, QMAP focused on a clear patch of sky around the North Star.
When the brightness fluctuations are exaggerated 100,000 times, blobs become clear. They correspond to clumps of matter that existed 300,000 years or so after the big bang. Their apparent size depends on the geometry of the universe and, in turn, on the cosmic density of matter and energy.
Combined with other observations, including those of distant supernova, the QMAP results corroborate the prevailing theory of inflation--with the twist that the universe is only one third matter (both ordinary and dark) and two thirds "quintessence," a bizarre form of energy, possibly inherent in empty space.
Despite Tegmark's enthusiasm, however, this conclusion is not definitive. Astronomers are still waiting for results from two upcoming satellites, the Microwave Anisotropy Probe and Planck; meanwhile other groups are flying balloons or taking ground-based measurements. They all hope to hold up or shoot down inflationary theory. "It's like an Indiana Jones movie," says Paul Steinhardt of Penn. "Everyone sees that holy grail."
sciam.com
--George Musser
There! Now does that clear things up?
Del |
