Stars, galaxies, universe and other terrestrial objects have always fascinated all age group. The more we know about it, the more curious we become and piled up with numerous queries. This has always been an interesting and quite riveting a topic to explore for scientist and for us, the common people. This might look plain to see but difficult to comprehend.
Some of our childhood memories revolve around counting the number of stars, combining the stars position to form different shapes, looking for the brightest star, searching them in a cloudy day and wondering about their absence. This is how most of ours childhood days would have surpassed wondering what are these objects so up above the sky.
My love for such terrestrial object grew when I studied physics at school. We were taught and given the basic knowledge to fairly form an idea about things surrounding us. Library became the storehouse for deeper insight to the topic. We learnt the intricacies involved in the subject. The curiosity had no match when I got to know things about our solar system, Milky Way, black holes in space, Supernova explosions of stars, Gravity, other forces in outer space, light years, big bang theory and the most important is the vastness of Universe. Prior to that, I had no clue how widely these object are placed to each other. This blew the wildest imagination.
As I grew old, my knowledge seemed to me minimal seeing the enormity of this subject but as it is so intriguing I started browsing to learn more. Thoughts like ‘Who created the Universe?’, ‘What are they made of? ‘, ‘How was it created?’, ‘When it was created? ‘Stormed my mind. The universe can seem bewildering at times. In the past century, we've learned an incredible amount about the cosmos: its 13.8 billion-year history, its structure (including the number and distribution of galaxies), and its possible future (increasingly rapid expansion forever).
There are various space programs that have been initiated shortly to know more about space. One of the major is Voyager Program. The Voyager program is a continuing American scientific program that employs two robotic probes, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, to study the outer solar system. Scientist keeps a close vigil on the space using giant telescopes. One of the most famous is the Hubble Space Telescope. We’ve found over a thousand planets outside our solar system just in the last 20 years.
The nearest star to earth apart from sun is Alpha Centauri, which is actually a triple-star system —three stars bound together by gravity. Alpha Centauri A and B are two bright, closely orbiting stars with a distant, dim companion, Proxima Centauri.It is 4.2 light years from earth. Light year means distance travelled by light in a year fr.Ex (1 light year = 365/366*24*60*60*300000 KM)
As we take birth and die, similarly a star also dies. The process is called Supernova. During a supernova, when a massive star explodes at the end of its life, the resulting high energy environment enables the creation of some of the heaviest elements including iron and nickel. The explosion also disperses the different elements across the universe, scattering the stardust which now makes up planets including Earth. Next time you’re out gazing at stars twinkling in the night sky, spare a thought for the tumultuous reactions they play host to. It’s easy to forget that stars owe their light to the energy released by nuclear fusion reactions at their cores. These are the very same reactions which created chemical elements like carbon or iron - the building blocks which make up the world around us.
Interesting and Mind-blowing Facts:
1. Looking at stars is basically looking into the past, because of how long it takes the light from them to reach us.
2. If you cry in space the tears just stick to your face.
3. You can listen to what interstellar space sounds like.
4. The sun makes up more than 99% of the mass of the solar system.
5. Almost every element in your body was made in an exploding star.
6. There might be another Earth-sized planet in the outer solar system.
Mind bending Theories:
1. A 4D black hole collapsed to form the universe.
2. Our universe is just one of many parallel universes, or maybe even an infinite number of parallel universes, in existence.
3. The universe will end in a “big crunch” as galaxies are pulled back together by gravity, ending in a kind of reversed Big Bang.
4. The universe will expand so much that eventually galaxies, solar systems, planets and even individual atoms will be ripped apart.
5. This is what will happen if the universe keeps expanding forever, but not enough to rip itself apart. The stars will go out and the black holes will evaporate. Also known as the “heat death” of the universe, it’s the sweet spot between a big crunch and a big rip.
6. The universe is a giant hologram, or, in more scientific language, “a projection of a two-dimensional shell”.
7. Scientists have long thought the universe looked the same in all directions, but this theory says that’s not the case – some bits of space are hotter than others.
8. Everything in the universe is being pushed apart by an invisible force called dark energy. It’s so powerful that it’s making the expansion of the universe accelerate.
9. Distant stars only look like they’re rushing away from us. But rather than stars speeding up, it happening because time is slowing down and we’re looking at them in the past, when time passed quicker.
10. Black holes are wormholes that connect our universe to other universes. Wormholes are hypothetical warps in the fabric of space-time that form a sort of tunnel.
There have been phenomenal discoveries in the field of space science but two big mysteries still elude physicists: What happened to the universe in its first instants? And what is the connection between gravity and the other forces of nature? Well saying that, the cognizance will increase with numerous space research projects that have been initiated by many countries.
