In The Beginning

(Big Bang Theory and

Formation of the
Light Elements)
Specific Learning Outcomes:
The learners should be able to:
1. Briefly discuss the cosmology
of the Big Bang model
2. Provide an overview of the
proof for the Big Bang model
3. Write reactions involving the
nucleosynthesis of the first
elements
 Bingo Game
Big Bang
Cosmology Theory/Big Bang Singularity
Model

Inflation Annihilation Recombination

Relative Cosmic
Redshift Abundance Microwave
Background
What is Cosmology?

Cosmology is the study

of how the universe
began, how it continues
to exist, and how it will
end.
COSMOLOGIES REGARDING THE ORIGIN OF THE UNIVERSE

Non-scientific Thought
• Ancient Egyptians believed in many gods and myths which
narrate that the world arose from an infinite sea at the first rising
of the sun.

• The Kuba people of Central Africa tell the story of a creator god
Mbombo (or Bumba) who, alone in a dark and water-covered
Earth, felt an intense stomach pain and then vomited the stars,
sun, and moon.

• In India, there is the narrative that gods sacrificed Purusha, the

primal man whose head, feet, eyes, and mind became the sky,
earth, sun, and moon respectively.

• The monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

claim that a supreme being created the universe, including man
and other living organisms.
 Science brings forth a
cosmological theory, not from
belief, but from scientific evidence
that the universe once began to
expand and continues to expand
until today. This theory was
eventually called the Big Bang
theory or Big Bang model.
What is Big Bang Theory?

The big bang theory is

a cosmological model
stating that the
universe started its
expansion about 13.8
billion years ago.
Pieces of evidence
supporting this theory
are (1) occurrence of
redshift, (2) cosmic
microwave
background, and (3)
abundance of light
elements.
Big Bang Theory
• As the currently accepted theory of the
origin and evolution of the universe,
the Big Bang Theory postulates that
13.8 billion years ago, the universe
expanded from a tiny, dense and hot
mass to its present size and much
cooler state.
Expanding Universe
• In 1929, Edwin Hubble announced his
significant discovery of the “redshift” and its
interpretation that galaxies are moving away
from each other, hence as evidence for an
expanding universe, just as predicted by
Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity.
• He observed that spectral lines of starlight
made to pass through a prism are shifted
toward the red part of the electromagnetic
spectrum, i.e., toward the band of lower
frequency; thus, the inference that the star or
galaxy must be moving away from us.
Expanding Universe

• Red shift as evidence for an expanding

universe. The positions of the absorptions
lines for helium for light coming from the Sun
are shifted towards the red end as compared
with those for a distant star. This evidence for
expansion contradicted the previously held
view of a static and unchanging universe.
Cosmic Microwave Background
• There is a pervasive cosmic microwave
background (CMB) radiation in the
universe. Its accidental discovery in
1964 by Arno Penzias and Robert
Woodrow Wilson earned them the
physics Nobel Prize in 1978.

• It can be observed as a strikingly

uniform faint glow in the microwave
band coming from all directions-
blackbody radiation with an average
temperature of about 2.7 degrees above
absolute zero.
Cosmic Microwave Background
Abundance of Light Elements
The observed abundance of light
elements supports the big bang theory.
The theory predicts that the universe is
composed of 73% hydrogen and 25%
helium by mass. The prediction
correlated to the measured abundances
of primordial material in unprocessed
gas in some parts of the universe with
no stars.
There are several limitations and misconceptions
associated with discussing the Big Bang Theory.

• The Big Bang refers to the very start of the whole

process called the Big Bang model.

• The Big Bang was NOT an explosion that carried

matter outward from a point. It refers to the rapid
inflation of space itself.

• The theory does not explain what caused it or

where the singularity came from. The model is a
work in progress that we are still finding evidence
for until now.
Key stages of the Big Bang theory/model.

a.The universe may have begun as an

infinitely hot and dense initial
singularity, a point with all of
space, time, matter and energy.
This means that there was no
where, when or what. There is no
space around the singularity – just
nothingness.
Key stages of the Big Bang theory/model.

b. All of it then began to rapidly

expand in a process known as
inflation. Space itself expanded
faster than the speed of light. In
this still hot and dense mass of the
universe, pairs of matter and
antimatter (quarks and antiquarks)
were formed from energy, but
these pairs cancelled each other
back into energy (annihilation).
Key stages of the Big Bang theory/model.

c. The universe cooled down as it

expanded. An excess of matter
(electrons, protons, neutrons and other
particles) somehow came to be in a
highly energetic “plasma soup.”
Photons (light particles) were being
scattered everywhere in this “soup”.
Protons and neutrons came together to
form different types of nuclei by
nucleosynthesis or nuclear fusion.
Key stages of the Big Bang theory/model.

d. Much later on, electrons

started to bind to ionized protons
and nuclei forming neutral atoms
in a process called recombination.
The bound particles no longer
scattered photons so light and
energy moved freely across space.
The period was hence known as
the “dark ages”.
Key stages of the Big Bang theory/model.

e. Gravity caused these atoms to

collapse onto one another to form
stars and galaxies and eventually,
other matter. This still happens
until today. Space also continues to
expand at an accelerating rate, thus
increasing the distance between the
matters inside it.