Abstract
In Chap. 18 we saw how Cepheid stars and type Ia supernovae have been used to measure the expansion of the universe. If we run the clock backward, we deduce that in the past the universe was smaller, denser, and hotter than it is today. In this chapter we use gas physics and particle physics to understand the early, hot phase of the universe, and we discuss observations that probe this phase directly (through the cosmic microwave background radiation) and indirectly (through the abundances of elements created in the first few minutes after the big bang).
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Notes
- 1.
See [3] for more of the story.
- 2.
While some mass is converted to energy via fusion in stars, it is a tiny fraction of the total.
- 3.
Electrons are leptons, and they contribute so little mass compared to baryons that we neglect them when characterizing the mass density of the universe. They are important when it comes to charge, though.
- 4.
Recall that we made a similar calculation for the Sun’s hydrogen in Sect. 14.1.3 and found a higher transition temperature of ∼ 104 K. In the Sun, the higher density facilitates recombination.
- 5.
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Keeton, C. (2014). Cosmology: Early Universe. In: Principles of Astrophysics. Undergraduate Lecture Notes in Physics. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9236-8_20
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