Ritz Lenard A.

Oreña 11 STEM 57

Earth and Life Science

Week1

B. Answer the following:

1.
Cosmic Microwave Background: Remnant of the Big Bang
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) is thought to be leftover radiation from the Big Bang,
or the time when the universe began. As the theory goes, when the universe was born it underwent a rapid
inflation and expansion. (The universe is still expanding today, and the expansion rate appears different
depending on where you look). The CMB represents the heat left over from the Big Bang.
You can't see the CMB with your naked eye, but it is everywhere in the universe. It is invisible to
humans because it is so cold, just 2.725 degrees above absolute zero (minus 459.67 degrees Fahrenheit, or
minus 273.15 degrees Celsius.) This means its radiation is most visible in the microwave part of the
electromagnetic spectrum.

Origins and discovery

The universe began 13.8 billion years ago, and the CMB dates back to about 400,000 years after
the Big Bang. That's because in the early stages of the universe, when it was just one-hundred-millionth
the size it is today, its temperature was extreme: 273 million degrees above absolute zero, according to
NASA.
Any atoms present at that time were quickly broken apart into small particles (protons and
electrons). The radiation from the CMB in photons (particles representing quantums of light, or other
radiation) was scattered off the electrons. "Thus, photons wandered through the early universe, just as
optical light wanders through a dense fog," NASA wrote.
About 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe was cool enough that hydrogen could form.
Because the CMB photons are barely affected by hitting hydrogen, the photons travel in straight lines.
Cosmologists refer to a "surface of last scattering" when the CMB photons last hit matter; after that, the
universe was too big. So when we map the CMB, we are looking back in time to 380,000 years after the
Big Bang, just after the universe was opaque to radiation.
American cosmologist Ralph Apher first predicted the CMB in 1948, when he was doing work
with Robert Herman and George Gamow, according to NASA. The team was doing research related to
Big Bang nucleosynthesis, or the production of elements in the universe besides the lightest isotope (type)
of hydrogen. This type of hydrogen was created very early in the universe's history.
But the CMB was first found by accident. In 1965, two researchers with Bell Telephone
Laboratories (Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson) were creating a radio receiver, and were puzzled by the
noise it was picking up. They soon realized the noise came uniformly from all over the sky. At the same
time, a team at Princeton University (led by Robert Dicke) was trying to find the CMB. Dicke's team got
wind of the Bell experiment and realized the CMB had been found.
Both teams quickly published papers in the Astrophysical Journal in 1965, with Penzias and
Wilson talking about what they saw, and Dicke's team explaining what it means in the context of the
universe. (Later, Penzias and Wilson both received the 1978 Nobel Prize in physics).

2.
Big-Bang Theory
 Scientists believe that the universe began in a “big-bang” about 13,600 million years ago. The
evidence of the Big-Bang Theory includes the very existence of a microwave background radiation, and
red-shift. Stars did not remain the same, they change as they age.
Scientists have gathered a lot of evidence and information about how the universe began and the
universe to this present day. They used these information along-side their observation and they developed
a theory about how all the matter in the universe was concentrated into a single tiny point about 13.7
billion years ago. The universe began to enlarge rapidly because of a hot explosion and is still expanding
continuously today. Evidence for the big-bang includes all the galaxies are moving away from us and the
further away a galaxy is, the faster it moves.
You may have noticed when an ambulance goes past, its siren is high-pitched as it comes towards
you, then becomes low-pitched as it goes further away. This effect, where there is a change in frequency
and wavelength is called the Doppler Effect. It happens in any wave source that moves relative to an
observer.
This happens with light too and it is called “red-shift”. Our sun contains helium. We know this
because there are black lines in the light spectrum of the sun where helium has absorbed the light. This is
called red-shift. It is a change in frequency of the position of the lines. Astronomers have found that the
further from us the star is, the more its light is red-shifted. This tells us that the distant galaxies are
moving away from us, and that the further away a galaxy is, the faster it is moving away.
Since we cannot assume that we have a special place in the universe, this is evidence for a
generally expanding universe. It suggests that everything is moving away from everything else. The big-
bang theory s an effort to explain what happened at the very beginning of our universe. Discoveries in
astronomy and physics have shown beyond a reasonable doubt that our universe did in fact have
beginning. Prior to that moment there was nothing; during and after that moment there was something:
our universe. The big-bang theory is an effort to explain what happened during and after that moment.

3.
In my opinion, Mars is the best choice to land, because researches this days shows that Mars is
habitable among other planets in our solar system, there are also signs that water can be found in the
planet.