January 2012 -  Runaway Universe

In October 2011, The Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Saul Perlmutter, Brian Schmidt and Adam Riess for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae.

To understand their discovery we need to travel back to the beginning of time.

IN THE BEGINNING 13.7 billion years ago there was Nothing. Then there was Some Thing the size of an ATOM.

In the very first second, this atom expanded (Inflation) at a rate faster than the speed of light with extreme temperatures.

 SPACE was born and filled with a Quark-Gluon Plasma. From this Plasma emerged Protons, Neutrons and their Anti Particles. (Anti Protons and Anti Neutrons).

A great battle ensued between the Protons, Neutrons and the Anti Protons, Anti Neutrons (a kind of good and evil battle). Protons and  Neutrons won the battle because for every 10 billion Anti Matter particles there was 10 billion +1 Matter particles. In addition to the surviving Protons and Neutrons, Electrons, Anti Electrons (Positrons), Neutrinos and Photons (light) were created by this Matter and Anti mater annihilation.

The Scientists said "Let there be Light" and saw that it was good. And so it was the first second of our Universe.
 
Because we have 13.7 billion years to go, let’s speed up the next three minutes. You may have noticed that Electrons and Anti Electrons resulted from battle of Protons, Neutrons and their anti counterparts. If you guessed another battle ensued between Electrons and Anti Electrons (Positrons) with some Electrons surviving and Photons (light) being the winner, you are correct. 
 
Over the next 380 thousand years as the expansion Space starts to slow down and the temperatures cool, Protons & Neutrons combine to form Hydrogen and Helium Nuclei. With cooler temperatures, Electrons connect to the Hydrogen and Helium Nuclei to create the first Atoms. This Afterglow Light Pattern also known as the Cosmic microwave background radiation was discovered by the two Bell Lab Scientists (Robert Wilson & Arno Penzias).
 
At this stage the many free Photons (light) transition to the dark side, I mean infrared light (sorry). The Universe becomes Dark for about 350 million years. After the Dark Ages, Stars are born and active for about a million years and then explode as Supernova. In about 2 billion years after the beginning, Stars that did not go Supernova, form the first Galaxies.

As Stars and Galaxies came on the scene (including our Milky Way) our Universe’s expansion was slowing down. This was the common scientific wisdom. In 1998 two groups of Astrophysics studying Supernova discovered that our Universe was not slowing down, but accelerating. This acceleration was caused by an energy force named Dark Energy. The switch from slowing down to accelerating occurred about 6.7 billion years ago. The October 2011 Nobel prize in physics was awarded to the leaders of the two groups. More on this topic will be posted in the future.


 My sources:  Mark Whittle,  University of Virginia                
                     Mark Wyman, University of Chicago