4605 - KILONOVA - when stars collide?

 

-  4605 -  KILONOVA  -  when stars collide?  -      Astronomers have witnessed the titanic collision between two neutron stars that resulted in the birth of the smallest black hole ever seen and forged precious metals like gold, silver, and uranium.   For the first time, we see the creation of atoms; we can measure the temperature of the matter and see the microphysics in this remote explosion.

-

---------------------------------------------   4605  -  KILONOVA  -  when stars collide?

-  This violent and powerful collision occurred 130 million light-years away from us in the galaxy “NGC 4993”.   It will hopefully paint a picture of the "past, present, and future" of the mergers of these dense dead stars. This could reveal the origins of elements heavier than iron, which can't be forged in even the most massive stars.

-

-   The collision and merger of the neutron stars results in a powerful blast of light called a "kilonova." As the wreckage of this event expands at nearly the speed of light, the kilonova illuminates its surroundings with light as bright as hundreds of millions of suns.

-

-    We can now see the moment where atomic nuclei and electrons are uniting in the afterglow. For the first time, we see the creation of atoms, we can measure the temperature of the matter, and we can see the microphysics in this remote explosion.  We see before, during, and after the moment of birth of the atoms.

-

-   The gold in your jewelry came from the universe's most violents events.    Neutron stars are born when stars at least 8 times as massive as the sun exhaust their fuel for nuclear fusion and can no longer support themselves against their own gravity.  They collapse and explode.

-

-    The outer layers of these stars are blasted away in supernova explosions, leaving a stellar remnant with a mass equal to between 1 and 2 suns crushed into a diameter of around 12 miles.

The collapse of the core forces electrons and protons together, creating a sea of particles called neutrons. This material is so dense that a mere sugar cube's worth of neutron star matter would weigh 1 billion tons if brought to Earth. That's about the same as cramming 150,000,000 elephants into the same space that a sugar cube occupies.

-

-   It is probably no surprise that this extreme and exotic matter plays a key role in creating elements heavier than iron.

-

-   Neutron stars don't always live in isolation. Some of these dead stars occupy binary systems along with a companion living star. In rare instances, this companion star is also massive enough to create a neutron star, and it isn't "kicked away" by the supernova explosion that creates the first neutron star.

-

-   The result is a system with two neutron stars orbiting each other. These objects are so dense that as they swirl around each other, they generate ripples in spacetime (the four-dimensional unification of space and time) called “gravitational waves” that ripple through space, carrying away angular momentum.

-

-   As the system loses angular momentum, the orbit of the neutron stars tightens, meaning that the neutron stars move closer to each other. This results in gravitational waves rippling away faster and faster, carrying away more and more angular momentum.

-

-   This situation ends when neutron stars are close enough for their immense gravity to take over and drag these extremely dense dead stars together to collide and merge.  This collision sprays out neutron-rich matter with temperatures of many billions of degrees, thousands of times hotter than the sun. These temperatures are so hot that they are similar to those of the rapidly inflating universe just one second after the Big Bang.

-

-   Ejected particles like electrons and neutrons dance around the body, the colliding neutron stars, which rapidly collapse to form a “black hole” in a fog of plasma that cools over the next few days.

-

-   Atoms in this cooling cloud of plasma quickly grab free neutrons  the rapid neutron capture process (r-process) and also ensnare free electrons. This creates very heavy but unstable particles that rapidly decay. This decay releases the light that astronomers see as kilonovas, but it also creates lighter elements that are still heavier than iron, like gold, silver and uranium.

-

-   This team saw the afterglow of particles being snatched to forge heavy elements like Strontium and Yttrium, reasoning that other heavy elements were undoubtedly created in the aftermath of this neutron star collision.

-

-   The matter expands so fast and gains in size so rapidly, to the extent where it takes hours for the light to travel across the explosion.   This is why, just by observing the remote end of the fireball, we can see further back in the history of the explosion. Closer to us, the electrons have hooked to atomic nuclei, but on the other side, on the far side of the newborn black hole, the 'present' is still just the future.  Think about that!

-

-   The team's results wouldn't have been possible without the collaboration of telescopes across the globe and beyond.   This astrophysical explosion develops dramatically hour by hour, so no single telescope can follow its entire story. The viewing angle of the individual telescopes to the event is blocked by the rotation of the Earth.  But by combining the existing measurements from Australia, South Africa, and the Hubble Space Telescope, we can follow its development in great detail.

-

- 

November 11, 2024         KILONOVA  -  when stars collide?             4605

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                                                                                       

--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Monday, November 11, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

4604 - EINSTEIN RING - could explain dark matter?

 

 -  4604 -  EINSTEIN  RING  -   could explain dark matter?  -    The  'Einstein ring' suggests that mysterious dark matter interacts with itself.   In the field of one of JWST's largest-area surveys, COSMOS-Web, an Einstein ring was discovered around a compact, distant galaxy. It turns out to be the most distant gravitational lens ever discovered by a few billion light-years.

-

------------------------------   4604  -  EINSTEIN  RING  -   could explain dark matter?

-    The remarkably dense JWST-ER1 galaxy and its Einstein ring, as captured by the James Webb Space Telescope last year.    A fresh analysis of a remarkably massive yet compact galaxy from the early universe suggests that dark matter interacts with itself.

-

-   The galaxy formed just 3.4 billion years after the Big Bang.  It was first spotted last October in images snapped by JWST.   At over 17 billion light-years from Earth, JWST-ER1g is the farthest-ever example of a perfect "Einstein ring", an unbroken circle of light around the galaxy, a result of light rays from a distant, unseen galaxy being bent due to the space-warping mass of JWST-ER1.

-

-    The cosmic mirage is not just a pretty sight from a lucky alignment of galaxies; it also offers physicists a valuable probe for model-independent measurements of the mass enclosed within the ring's radius.

-

-    By calculating just how much JWST-ER1g has warped space-time around itself, the discovery team had estimated that the galaxy weighs about 650 billion suns, which makes it a peculiarly dense galaxy for its size. By subtracting the visible stellar mass from the total inferred mass, physicists can measure how much of the galaxy is dark matter, an invisible substance thought to make up over 80% of all matter in our universe.

-

-   Despite decades of observations and heaps of circumstantial evidence, the elusive substance is yet to be directly detected. In JWST-ER1g, the discovery team determined that dark matter explains just about half the mass gap, and that "additional mass appears to be needed to explain the lensing results.

-

-    JWST-ER1g's unusually high density could be explained by a higher population of stars than currently thought. However, a contraction mechanism by which ordinary matter "collapses and condenses" into JWST-ER1g's dark matter halo could be packing "more dark matter mass in the same volume, resulting in higher density.

-

-    The halo of dark matter, densest at the galaxy's center, is the gravitational glue that prevents spinning galaxies from flying apart. Furthermore, models incorporating a certain type of dark matter, in which its particles interact with themselves, provide "an excellent fit to the measurement of JWST-ER1.

-

-    We don't yet know what dark matter actually is. Observational clues suggest it is a new kind of particle whose presence can only be inferred from its gravitational interactions with ordinary matter. Dark matter could be just one kind of particle or a complex variety of different types, like in normal matter, that perhaps operates in the presence of additional,  unknown forces exclusive to dark matter.

-

-   Self-interactions could explain extremely dense dark matter halos in certain galaxies, as well as puzzlingly low densities in others, both of which are unexplained by the prevailing "cold dark matter" theory.

-

-   Physicists hope JWST can shed more light on dark matter, so to speak. The telescope's unprecedented infrared eyes peer further back in time than any other telescope, and its upcoming investigations of galaxies from the very early universe could reveal clues about dark matter particles and their behavior.

-

-    We expect to see more surprises from JWST and learn more about dark matter soon.

-

-  November 10, 2024        EINSTEIN  RING  -   could explain dark matter?         4604

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                                                                                        

--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Monday, November 11, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

4603 - NEUTRON STARS COLLIDE - gives birth to atoms?

 

-  4603 -  NEUTRON  STARS  COLLIDE  -  gives birth to atoms?  -  Neutron stars collide and explode to create black hole and 'birth atoms'   For the first time, we see the creation of atoms; we can measure the temperature of the matter and see the microphysics in this remote neutron star explosion.

-

----------------------------------   4603  -  NEUTRON  STARS  COLLIDE  -  gives birth to atoms?

-

-    Astronomers have witnessed the titanic collision between two neutron stars that resulted in the birth of the smallest black hole ever seen and forged precious metals like gold, silver, and uranium.

-

-   This violent and powerful collision occurred 130 million light-years away from us in the galaxy “NGC 4993” was created with a range of instruments, including the Hubble Space Telescope. It will hopefully paint a picture of the "past, present, and future" of the mergers of these dense dead stars. This could reveal the origins of elements heavier than iron, which can't be forged in even the most massive stars.

-

-    The collision and merger of the neutron stars results in a powerful blast of light called a "kilonova." As the wreckage of this event expands at nearly the speed of light, the kilonova illuminates its surroundings with light as bright as hundreds of millions of suns.

-

-    We can now see the moment where atomic nuclei and electrons are uniting in the afterglow. For the first time, we see the creation of atoms, we can measure the temperature of the matter, and we can see the microphysics in this remote explosion.

-

-   The gold in your jewelry came from the universe's most violents events.  Neutron stars are born when stars at least 8 times as massive as the sun exhaust their fuel for nuclear fusion and can no longer support themselves against their own gravity.

-

-    The outer layers of these stars are blasted away in supernova explosions, leaving a stellar remnant with a mass equal to between 1 and 2 suns crushed into a diameter of around 12 miles.

The collapse of the core forces electrons and protons together, creating a sea of particles called neutrons.

-

-   This material is so dense that a mere sugar cube's worth of neutron star matter would weigh 1 billion tons if brought to Earth. That's about the same as cramming 150,000,000 elephants into the same space that a sugar cube occupies.

-

-    Neutron stars don't always live in isolation. Some of these dead stars occupy binary systems along with a companion living star. In rare instances, this companion star is also massive enough to create a neutron star, and it isn't "kicked away" by the supernova explosion that creates the first neutron star.

-

-   The result is a system with two neutron stars orbiting each other. These objects are so dense that as they swirl around each other, they generate ripples in spacetime (the four-dimensional unification of space and time) called “gravitational waves? that ripple through space, carrying away angular momentum.

-

-    As the system loses angular momentum, the orbit of the neutron stars tightens, and the neutron stars move closer to each other. This results in gravitational waves rippling away faster and faster, carrying away more and more angular momentum.

-

-    This situation ends when neutron stars are close enough for their immense gravity to take over and drag these extremely dense dead stars together to collide and merge.  This collision sprays out neutron-rich matter with temperatures of many billions of degrees, thousands of times hotter than the sun. These temperatures are so hot that they are similar to those of the rapidly inflating universe just one second after the Big Bang.

-

-    Ejected particles like electrons and neutrons dance around the body, birthed by the colliding neutron stars, which rapidly collapse to form a black hole in a fog of plasma that cools over the next few days.

-

-    Atoms in this cooling cloud of plasma quickly grab free neutrons via what is called the “rapid neutron capture process” (r-process) and also ensnare free electrons. This creates very heavy but unstable particles that rapidly decay. This decay releases the light that astronomers see as kilonovas, but it also creates lighter elements that are still heavier than iron, like gold, silver and uranium.

-

-   This team saw the afterglow of particles being snatched to forge heavy elements like Strontium and Yttrium, reasoning that other heavy elements were undoubtedly created in the aftermath of this neutron star collision.

-

-    The matter expands so fast and gains in size so rapidly, to the extent where it takes hours for the light to travel across the explosion.  This is why, just by observing the remote end of the fireball, we can see further back in the history of the explosion. Closer to us, the electrons have hooked to atomic nuclei, but on the other side, on the far side of the newborn black hole, the 'present' is still just the future.

-

-    This astrophysical explosion develops dramatically hour by hour, so no single telescope can follow its entire story. The viewing angle of the individual telescopes to the event is blocked by the rotation of the Earth.   But by combining the existing measurements from Australia, South Africa, and the Hubble Space Telescope, we can follow its development in great detail.

-

-

November 4, 2024       NEUTRON  STARS  COLLIDE  -  gives birth to atoms?      4603

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                                                                                       

--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Monday, November 11, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

 

-  4602 -  MILKY  WAY  -  James Webb latest findings?  -    James Webb telescope finds 1st possible 'failed stars' beyond the Milky Way.  They could reveal new secrets of the early universe. They may have found dozens of elusive brown dwarfs , strange objects larger than planets but smaller than stars, beyond the Milky Way for the first time ever.

-----------------   4602    -  MILKY  WAY  -  James Webb latest findings?

-    Astronomers zooming in on the young star cluster “NGC 602” in the nearby Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) spotted what may be the first evidence of brown dwarfs ever seen outside the Milky Way.

-

-     Brown dwarfs, or "failed stars," are peculiar objects that are bigger than the largest planets but not massive enough to sustain nuclear fusion like stars.   Brown dwarfs seem to form in the same way as stars, they just don't capture enough mass to become a fully fledged star.

-

-   “NGC 602” is a roughly 3 million-year-old star-forming cluster on the outskirts of the SMC, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way that contains roughly 3 billion stars. (Our galaxy, in comparison, contains an estimated 100 billion to 400 billion stars.) Orbiting about 200,000 light-years from Earth, the SMC is one of the Milky Way's closest intergalactic neighbors.

-

-    Previous observations of NGC 602 taken with the Hubble Space Telescope revealed that the cluster hosts a population of young, low-mass stars. Now, thanks to JWST's incredible sensitivity to infrared light, astronomers have fleshed out the picture of these stellar newborns, revealing precisely how much mass they have accumulated in their short lives.

-

-    The results suggest that 64 stellar objects within the cluster have masses ranging between 50 and 84 times that of Jupiter. Brown dwarfs typically weigh between 13 and 75 Jupiter masses,  making many of these objects prime candidates to be the first brown dwarfs spotted beyond our galaxy.

-

-   These failed stars appear to have formed in much the same way as stars like the sun through the collapse of massive clouds of gas and dust. However, for a collapsed cloud to become a star, it must continue accumulating mass until it reaches an internal temperature and pressure high enough to trigger hydrogen fusion at its core combining hydrogen atoms into helium and releasing energy as light and heat in the process.

-

-    Brown dwarfs never acquire enough mass to sustain permanent fusion, leaving them larger than a planet but smaller and dimmer than a star. This failure to ignite may be a common outcome in the universe.  Astronomers have discovered about 3,000 brown dwarfs in the Milky Way but estimate that there may be as many as 100 billion in our galaxy alone, potentially making them as common as stars themselves.

-

-    Studying this group of extragalactic failed stars further could help clarify why so many stars seemingly fail to ignite. But according to the researchers, these oddball objects could also reveal new insights about the early universe. NGC 602 is a young cluster containing low abundances of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, so its composition is thought to be very similar to that of the ancient universe.

-

-    By studying the young metal-poor brown dwarfs newly discovered in NGC 602, we are getting closer to unlocking the secrets of how stars and planets formed in the harsh conditions of the early Universe.

-  

-  November 7, 2024           MILKY  WAY  -  James Webb latest findings?             4602

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                                                                                       

--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Saturday, November 9, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

4601 - BIG BANG THEORY - what started it all?

 

-  4601 -  BIG  BANG  THEORY  -  what started it all?  -    The Big Bang theory describes how the universe was born in a cataclysmic explosion almost 14 billion years ago. In a tiny fraction of a second, the observable universe grew by the equivalent of a bacterium expanding to the size of the Milky Way. This early universe was extraordinarily hot and extremely dense.

--------------------------------------   4601  -  BIG  BANG  THEORY  -  what started it all?

-   In 1929, the American astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered that distant galaxies are moving away from each other, leading to the realization that the universe is expanding. If we were to wind the clock back to the birth of the cosmos, the expansion would reverse and the galaxies would fall on top of each other 14 billion years ago. This age agrees nicely with the ages of the oldest astronomical objects we observe.

-

-   In 1964, Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson detected a particular type of radiation that fills all of space. This became known as the “cosmic microwave background” (CMB) radiation. It is a kind of afterglow of the Big Bang explosion, released when the cosmos was a mere 380,000 years old.

-

-    The CMB provides a window into the hot, dense conditions at the beginning of the universe. Penzias and Wilson were awarded the 1978 Nobel Prize in Physics for their discovery.  More recently, experiments at particle accelerators like the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have shed light on conditions even closer to the time of the Big Bang.

-

-     Our understanding of physics at these high energies suggests that, in the very first moments after the Big Bang, the four fundamental forces of physics that exist today were initially combined in a single force.

-

-    The present day four forces are gravity, electromagnetism, the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force. As the universe expanded and cooled down, a series of dramatic changes, called phase transitions (like the boiling or freezing of water), separated these forces.

-

-    Experiments at particle accelerators suggest that a few billionths of a second after the Big Bang, the latest of these phase transitions took place. This was the breakdown of electroweak unification, when electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force ceased to be combined. This is when all the matter in the universe assumed its mass.

-

-    Moving on further in time, the universe is filled with a strange substance called “quark-gluon plasma”.   This "primordial soup" was made up of quarks and gluons. These are sub-atomic particles that are responsible for the strong nuclear force. Quark-gluon plasma was artificially generated in 2010 at the Brookhaven National Laboratory and in 2015 at the LHC.

-

-    Quarks and gluons have a strong attraction for one another and today are bound together as protons and neutrons, which in turn are the building blocks of atoms. However, in the hot and dense conditions of the early universe, they existed independently.

-

-    The quark-gluon plasma didn't last long. Just a few millionths of a second after the Big Bang, as the universe expanded and cooled, quarks and gluons clumped together as protons and neutrons, the situation that persists today. This event is called “quark confinement”.

-

-   As the universe expanded and cooled still further, there were fewer high energy photons (particles of light) in the universe than there had previously been. This is a trigger for the process called “Big Bang nucleosynthesis” (BBN). This is when the first atomic nuclei, the dense lumps of matter made of protons and neutrons and found at the centers of atoms, formed through nuclear fusion reactions, like those that power the sun.

-

-    Back when there were more high energy photons in the universe, any atomic nuclei that formed would have been quickly destroyed by them (a process called photodisintegration). BBN ceased just a few minutes after the Big Bang, but its consequences are observable today.

-

-    Observations by astronomers have provided us with evidence for the primordial abundances of elements produced in these fusion reactions. The results closely agree with the theory of BBN. If we continued on, over nearly 14 billion years of time, we would reach the situation that exists today.

-

-    Scientists have no direct evidence for what came before the breakdown of electroweak unification (when electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force ceased to be combined). At such high energies and early times, we can only stare at the mystery of the Big Bang.

-

-   When we go backwards in time through the history of the universe, the distances and volumes shrink, while the average energy density grows. At the Big Bang, distances and volumes drop to zero, all parts of the universe fall on top of each other and the energy density of the universe becomes infinite. Our mathematical equations, which describe the evolution of space and the expansion of the cosmos, become infested by zeros and infinities and stop making sense.

-

-   We call this a “singularity”. Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity describes how spacetime is shaped. “Spacetime” is a way of describing the three-dimensional geometry of the universe, blended with time. A curvature in spacetime gives rise to gravity.

-

-   But mathematics suggests there are places in the universe where the curvature of spacetime becomes unlimited. These locations are “singularities”. One such example can be found at the center of a black hole. At these places, the theory of general relativity breaks down.

-

-   From 1965 to 1966, the British theoretical physicists Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose presented a number of mathematical theorems demonstrating that the spacetime of an expanding universe must end at a singularity in the past: the Big Bang singularity.

-

-   Space and time appear at the Big Bang singularity, so questions of what happens "before" the Big Bang are not well defined. As far as science can tell, there is no before; the Big Bang is the beginning of “time”.

-

-   However, nature is not accurately described by general relativity alone, even though the latter has been around for more than 100 years and has not been disproven. “General relativity” cannot describe atoms, nuclear fusion or radioactivity. These phenomena are instead addressed by “quantum theory”.

-

-    Theories from "classical" physics, such as relativity, are deterministic. This means that certain initial conditions have a definite outcome and are therefore absolutely predictive. Quantum theory, on the other hand, is probabilistic. This means that certain initial conditions in the universe can have multiple outcomes.

 

-

-    “Quantum theory” is somewhat predictive, but in a probabilistic way. Outcomes are assigned a probability of existing. If the mathematical distribution of probabilities is sharply peaked at a certain outcome, then the situation is well described by a "classical" theory such as general relativity. But not all systems are like this. In some systems, for example atoms, the probability distribution is spread out and a classical description does not apply.

-

-    In the vast majority of cases, gravity is well described by classical physics. Classical spacetime is smooth. However, when curvature becomes extreme, near a singularity, then the quantum nature of gravity cannot be ignored. Here, spacetime is no longer smooth, similar to a carpet which looks smooth from afar but up-close is full of fibers and threads.

-

-   Thus, near the Big Bang singularity, the structure of spacetime ceases to be smooth. Mathematical theorems suggest that spacetime becomes overwhelmed by features of hooks, loops and bubbles. This rapidly fluctuating situation is called “spacetime foam”.

-

-    In “spacetime foam”, causality does not apply, because there are closed loops in spacetime where the future of an event is also its past (so its outcome can also be its cause). The probabilistic nature of quantum theory suggests that, when the probability distribution is evenly spread out, all outcomes are equally possible and the comfortable notion of causality we associate with a classical understanding of physics is lost.

-

-    Therefore, if we go back in time, just before we encounter the Big Bang singularity, we find ourselves entering an epoch where the quantum effects of gravity are dominant and causality does not apply. This is called the “Planck epoch”.

-

-   Time ceases to be linear, going from the past to the future, and instead becomes wrapped, chaotic and random. This means the question "why did the Big Bang occur?" has no meaning, because outside causality, “events do not need a cause to take place”.

-

-   In order to understand how physics works at a singularity like the Big Bang, we need a theory for how gravity behaves according to quantum theory. Unfortunately, we do not have one. There are a number of efforts on this front like “loop quantum gravity” and “string theory”.

-  

-     However, these efforts are at best incomplete, because the problem is notoriously difficult.

So how did our expanding and largely classical universe ever escape from spacetime foam? This brings us to “cosmic inflation”. This is defined as a period of accelerated expansion in the early universe. It was first introduced by the Russian theoretical physicist Alexei Starobinsky in 1980 and in parallel, that same year, by the American physicist Alan Guth, coined the name.

-

-   “Inflation” makes the universe large and uniform, according to observations. It also forces the universe to be spatially flat, which is an otherwise unstable situation, but which has also been confirmed by observations.    Inflation provides a natural mechanism to generate the primordial irregularities in the density of the universe that are essential for structures such as galaxies and galaxy clusters to form.

-

-    Precision observations of the “cosmic microwave background” in recent decades have spectacularly confirmed the predictions of “inflation”. We also know that the universe can indeed undergo accelerated expansion, because in the last few billion years it started doing it again.

-

-   If the conditions for inflation arise (by chance) in a patch of fluctuating spacetime, as can occur with spacetime foam, then this region inflates and starts conforming to classical physics.

According to an idea first proposed by the Russian-American physicist Andrei Linde, inflation is a natural, and perhaps inevitable, consequence of chaotic initial conditions in the early universe.

-

-   The point is that our classical universe could have emerged from chaotic conditions, like those in spacetime foam, by experiencing an initial boost of inflation. This would have set off the expansion of the universe. In fact, the observations by astronomers of the CMB suggest that the initial boost is explosive, since the expansion is exponential during inflation.

-

-   The 14 billion-year story of our universe begins with a cataclysmic explosion everywhere in space, which we call the Big Bang. That much is beyond reasonable doubt. This explosion is really a period of explosive expansion, which we call cosmic inflation. What happens before inflation, though? Is it a spacetime singularity, is it spacetime foam? The answer is largely unknown.

-

-    In fact, it might even be unknowable, because there is a mathematical theorem which forbids us from accessing information about the onset of inflation, much like the one that prevents us from knowing about the interiors of black holes. So, from our point of view, cosmic inflation is the Big Bang, the explosion that started it all.

-

- 

-  November 5, 2024     BIG  BANG  THEORY  -  what started it all         4601

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                                                                                       

--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Thursday, November 7, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

4600 - Voyager Space Craft - transmitting from outerspace.

 

-  4600 -  Voyager Space Craft -  transmitting from outerspace.   Voyager Space Craft has revealed that it has re-established contact following a brief, nerve-wracking period of radio silence.   The spacecraft recently switched off one of its two radio transmitters, and experts are now on a mission to determine what caused it.

----------------------------   4600  -  Voyager Space Craft  -  transmitting from outerspace.

-    Voyagers 1 and 2 have been soaring through space for over 47 years and are the only two spacecraft operating in interstellar space outside our solar system. Their advanced age has led to increased technical issues and new challenges for the mission engineering team.

-

-   Scientists suspect the transmitter shut-off was triggered by the spacecraft's fault protection system, which autonomously reacts to onboard problems.   If the spacecraft uses too much power, the fault protection will save energy by switching off non-essential systems.

-

-   However, it could take days or weeks for the team to pinpoint the root cause that activated the fault protection system. When the flight team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California sends instructions to the spacecraft via the agency's Deep Space Network, Voyager 1 returns engineering data that the team evaluates to see how the spacecraft responded to the command.

-

-   This process usually takes a couple of days - nearly 23 hours for the command to travel more than 15 billion miles from Earth to the spacecraft, and another 23 hours for the data to return.

-

-   On October 16, 2024,  the flight team issued a command to activate one of Voyager 1's heaters. Despite the spacecraft having sufficient power for the heater, the command set off the fault protection system.

-

-   The issue came to light when the Deep Space Network failed to pick up Voyager 1's signal on October 18. Typically, the spacecraft communicates with Earth using an X-band radio transmitter.

-

-    The flight team correctly guessed that the fault protection system had reduced the transmitter's rate of sending back data. This mode uses less power from the spacecraft, but it also alters the X-band signal that the Deep Space Network needs to detect.

-

-   Engineers located the signal later that day, and Voyager 1 seemed stable as the team started investigating the incident. However, on October 19, communication seemed to cease completely.

-

-   The flight team theorized that Voyager 1's fault protection system had been triggered twice more, turning off the X-band transmitter and switching to a second radio transmitter known as the S-band. Although the S-band uses less power, Voyager 1 hasn't used it to communicate with Earth since 1981.

-

-   It operates on a different frequency than the X-band transmitters, and its signal is significantly weaker. Due to the spacecraft's distance, the flight team wasn't sure if the S-band could be detected on Earth, but engineers with the Deep Space Network managed to locate it.

-

-     Instead of reactivating the X-band before identifying what set off the fault protection system, the team issued a command on October 22 to verify the functionality of the S-band transmitter. The team is now collecting data that will assist them in understanding what transpired and restoring Voyager 1 to its regular operations.

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-  November 4, 2024     Voyager Space Craft  -  transmitting from outerspace.          4600

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--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Thursday, November 7, 2024  ---------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

4599 - QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT - is it real?

 

-  4599 -   QUANTUM  ENTANGLEMENT  -  is it real?       The best-ever observation of 'spooky action' between quarks is highest-energy quantum entanglement ever detected.   The discovery of two entangled quarks at the large Hadron Collider is the highest-energy observation of entanglement ever made.

-------------------------   4599  -  QUANTUM  ENTANGLEMENT  -  is it real?

-    Physicists at the world's largest atom smasher have observed two quarks in a state of quantum entanglement for the first time.  The observation, made at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, near Geneva, revealed a top quark, the heaviest fundamental particle, quantumly linked to its antimatter counterpart in the highest-energy detection of entanglement ever made.

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-   The ATLAS experiment (A Toroidal LHC Apparatus) is the largest detector at the LHC, and picks out the tiny subatomic particles created after beams of particles crash into each other at near light speeds.

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-    While “particle physics” is deeply rooted in “quantum mechanics”, the observation of quantum entanglement in a new particle system was made and at much higher energy than previously possible.

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-    Particles that are entangled have their properties connected to each other, so that a change to one instantaneously causes a change to another, even if they are separated by vast distances.

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-    Albert Einstein famously dismissed the idea as "spooky action at a distance," but later experiments proved that the bizarre, locality-breaking effect is indeed real.   This “heaviest antimatter particle” ever discovered could hold secrets to our universe's origins.

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-   But there are many aspects of entanglement that remain unexplored, and the one between quarks is one of them. This is because the subatomic particles cannot exist on their own, instead fusing together into various particle "recipes" called hadrons. Mixtures of three quarks are called “baryons” , such as the proton and the neutron,  and combinations of quarks and their antimatter opposites are called “mesons”.

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-    When individual quarks are ripped from hadrons, the energy used to extract them makes them immediately unstable, and they decay into branching jets of smaller particles in a process known as “hadronization”.

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-    This means that to observe the entanglement of a top quark and an antiquark, scientists at the LHC's ATLAS and Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detectors had to pick out the distinct particles that they decayed into from billions of others.  They looked for particles whose decay products were emitted at a distinct angle that occurs only between entangled particles.

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-    By measuring these angles and correcting for experimental effects that may have changed them, the team observed entanglement between top particles with a large enough statistical significance to be considered “real”. Now that the entangled particles have been spotted, the scientists say they want to study them to further probe unknown physics.

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-    With measurements of entanglement and other quantum concepts in a new particle system and at an energy range beyond what was previously accessible, we can test the Standard Model of particle physics in new ways and look for signs of new physics that may lie beyond it

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-   The new space-based “atom interferometry” will lead to exciting new discoveries and fantastic quantum technologies impacting everyday life, and will transport us into a quantum future.

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-    Scientists at NASA's Cold Atom Lab (CAL) onboard the International Space Station (ISS) have announced that, for the first time, they have successfully made high-precision measurements using a quantum sensor based on ultra-cold atoms of the element Rubidium.

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-   This is a significant achievement with wide-ranging applications, as these sensors could surpass traditional ones in sensitivity and accuracy, enabling advancements in fields like GPS technology and telecommunications.

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-   Working versions of these sensors would offer new opportunities for scientific discoveries through the study of quantum phenomena, testing the limits of fundamental physics.    Maybe even pushing beyond theories such as general relativity and the Standard Model of particle physics.

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-    The atom interferometer technique is based on the same principles as optical interferometry, where light is split into two beams that travel along different optical paths before getting combined to produce interference. Any differences between the beams' paths allows for extremely precise detection of changes in the environment.

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-   Instead of light, however, atom interferometry uses atoms cooled to near absolute zero (-459 degrees Fahrenheit), and relies on their ability to exist in multiple positions and motions at the same time due to quantum effects that become apparent at this ultra-cold temperature.

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-    When atoms move through an interferometer, they create patterns called “fringes”, which contain information about forces like gravity or other environmental influences. And, because atoms move much slower than light, they are affected by these forces for a longer time, allowing for very precise measurements that are much more sensitive than their optical counterparts.

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-    On Earth, atom interferometers have allowed scientists to achieve incredible feats, such as building absolute gravimeters and investigating changes in fundamental constants of nature with baffling accuracy. But physicists have been eager to apply atom interferometry in space, where microgravity helps eliminate interference and allows scientists to take even longer measurements that would actually improve the instrument's sensitivity altogether.

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-    The CAL scientists were able to run their measurements remotely from Earth.   It will become possible to make even more precise measurements of gravity that would allow us to investigate and understand our universe  in greater detail than ever.   They could reveal the composition of planets and moons in our solar system, because different materials have different densities that create subtle variations in gravity.

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-   This enhanced sensitivity could also enable scientists to finally detect “dark matter”, an elusive substance that has remained a cosmic mystery due to its weak interactions with particles and gravitational fields.

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-    Atom interferometry could also be used to test Einstein's theory of general relativity in new ways.   This is the basic theory explaining the large-scale structure of our universe, and we know that there are aspects of the theory that we don’t understand correctly. This technology may help us fill in those gaps and give us a more complete picture of the reality we inhabit.

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-  November 4, 2024               QUANTUM  ENTANGLEMENT  -  is it real?           4599

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--------  Comments appreciated and Pass it on to whomever is interested. ---

---   Some reviews are at:  --------------     http://jdetrick.blogspot.com ----- 

--  email feedback, corrections, request for copies or Index of all reviews

---  to:  ------    jamesdetrick@comcast.net  ------  “Jim Detrick”  -----------

--------------------- ---  Thursday, November 7, 2024  ---------------------------------