New cosmic 'baby pictures' reveal our universe taking its 1st steps towards stars and galaxies

[Admin]

The clearest and most precise images yet of the universe’s infancy from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope show the first steps toward the first stars and galaxies.

New cosmic 'baby pictures' reveal our universe taking its 1st steps towards stars and galaxies : Read more

 

[Helio]

Great story.

I hope a little pedantry is okay.

“Prior to around 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe was a dark place, quite literally. “

Nit – It wasn’t a dark place, but a very bright place but….

“and thus, the cosmos was opaque like a dense fog.”

Yes, but a very bright fog (3000K energies). [This, I think, is not expressed as 3000 Kelvin, but 3000 kelvins.]

“The universe's mass was calculated to be equivalent to around 2 trillion trillion (2 followed by 36 zeroes) suns…”

Let’s make that 24 zeroes instead?

What I see as significant in the findings is how well it matches astronomers’ estimates.

There are at least two papers, IIRC, that argued for about 2 trillion observable galaxies. This is a huge extrapolation on the number seen via gravitational lensing. Given the great isotropy of the universe, it should be fairly accurate, IMO.

This article shows an estimate of galactic material to be about 100 zeta suns. If so, then if we guess that the early galaxies had about 50 billion stars, and there are 2 trillion of them, then we would have 5E10 * 2E12 = 10E22 or 100 zeta suns!

Thus, if I’m right, we have a significant agreement using multiple techniques! Impressive!

[Added: BTW, this 50 billion sun estimate for the earliest galaxies should be observable, given enough gravity lens observations. I am ignoring the dark nebulae regions, intergalactic masses, etc, so perhaps the star count per galaxy will be notably less.]

 

[Helio]

It also talks about the Hubble Tension. I still don't understand the basis to the disagreement.

If DE is just a little stronger than predicted, then why wouldn't we see the two H-L constants match?

The CMBR predicts astronomers should be seeing a rate of about 67 kps/Mpc, but they measure something around 73 kps/Mpc.

So, the CMBR rate, I think (lamely, apparently), with a little more acceleration, would increase that CMBR rate's prediction for today, right?

What good is acceleration if you never go faster?