The origin and evolution of the

universe
Julieta Fierro, Susana Deustua, Beatriz García

International Astronomical Union,

Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México
Space Telescope Science Institute, USA
ITeDA and Universidad Tecnológica Nacional, Argentina
 The universe is everything:
Space
Matter
Energy
The time

It is in continuous evolution.
Each object in the universe changes, as
well as our ideas about them.
 It’s been less than one century since we have
enough observations to quantify the universe and
try to do the science on that subject.

The last few decades we have information about the

universe and we can study it. Before there were only
speculations.
 Our intuitive appreciation of the universe is not
the standard model of the Big Bang.

Historically, cultures attempt to explain the universe. For

example, Babylonians thought that the Earth is flat, with
certain elevations, and supported by elephants which, in
turn, are placed on a tortoise surrounded by one snake.
They were explaining the earthquakes with
rearrangements of elephants.
 Testing of the model:
The shadow of an elephant Only one sphere always has a
and a turtle, never looks like circular shadow. Demonstration
the shadow of the Earth on a Moon Eclipse
the Moon.
 Advances in science
◼ Reflecting
◼ Thinking about questions we have about the
nature
◼ Experimenting
◼ Thinking about the results
◼ Socializing the new knowledge through articles
◼ When other thinkers comment favorably our
ideas, the knowledge is consolidated. Also
when we learn from our mistakes.
Standard model of the Big Bang
◼ This is the most simple one and explains
the observations:
• Expansion
• Cosmic background radiation
• Chemical abundances
• Isotropy
◼ There are other models

❑ Science does not claim to have

the truth – it is unattainable.
 Expansion of the Universe

❑ The Universe was Nucleosynthesis

formed 14,000 million
years ago.

Temperature
Formation of galaxies
❑ Everything started
when energy was
released from the Solar system
vacuum
❑ This expanded and Present 3° K

cooled in the process Time

❑ As a result, this energy (Not in scale)

was transformed into

matter
Physics studied in the Earth
and applied to the rest of the
universe is Astrophysics.

Albert Einstein discovered that

the energy can be converted
into the matter and vice versa.
At the beginning of the
universe, the vacuum energy
converted to matter. Equivalence between matter and energy

Inside the stars the energy E = mc2

turns into matter, that’s why quarks , leptons
p+ n e -
they shine.
 At the beginning all matter
was ionized
Later it recombined to
form neutral atoms

Atoms formed clouds,

and inside, the first
galaxies with the first
stars.

Later, the rocky planets (such as Earth)

were formed and the first life appeared.
 Chemical evolution
Protons, neutrons and electrons formed in the first minute of
the universe. They formed the simplest atoms, H and He.
E = mc2
H - Formed by a proton p+
4 H - Turns to He + 2ν + 2e+ + 2γ
➢The rest of the elements formed inside the stars through
thermonuclear reactions.
➢The heaviest atoms, such as uranium, occurs when stars
explode and eject particles that collide, forming new elements.
➢Thousands of millions of years passed after the Big Bang,
when elements other than hydrogen and helium were formed
through stellar evolution.
 Physics and cosmology
We can explain the daily life matter with quarks,
constituents of protons, neutrons, and leptons (one of
the best-known is the electron) and their interactions,
such as electromagnetism.
Family Interaction
lepton electron neutrino Electromagnetic force
quarks up down Strong force
baryon proton neutron Week force, strong force

This simplicity of the model helps to understand how

was the early Universe, where energy was transforming
into matter and matter into energy.
Through observations we learn about

❑ The physical properties of the celestial objects

❑ Sizes and distances
❑ Times and ages
❑ Expansion rate of the universe
❑ Temperature of the background radiation
❑ Chemical composition
❑ Structure of the Universe
❑ Why the night is dark
❑ The existence of dark matter and dark energy
 The Sun

The most studied

objects are the
brightest ones –
easiest to do it.

The Sun and the

rest of the stars
are the most
known objects.
Extra solar planets
In addition to stars,
in the past few years
a hundreds of planets
have been discovered
around other stars,
not because they emit
light, but because
they disrupt the
stellar orbits and light
curves.
 Another property of
Life the Universe is life.
We have not yet
discovered the life
outside the Earth.

We believe that it
requires water to
flourish because it
facilitates the
exchange of
substances and the
formation of complex
molecules.
 Interstellar matter
The space between the stars is not empty, it is filled by
interstellar matter. This is the material from which the new
stars form.
The stars are born inside the
clouds of gas and dust. The
clouds are compressed forming
new stars. They spend the
biggest part of their life
transforming in their core
hydrogen into helium and energy.
Then later forming carbon, nitrogen and
oxygen - the elements that we are made of.
 Life cycle of Sun-like star

When stars exhaust their fuel, they eject into the

surrounding space particles created inside of them.
After each stellar generation, the interstellar medium -
where new stars born – become more abundant
with this elements.
 Clusters
Many stars are agglomerated in clusters containing
between 100 and 1,000,000 stars

Jewel Box, open Omega Centauri,

cluster globular cluster
 Galaxies
Conglomerates by
excellence are the
galaxies, the spiral one
like ours, have >100
billion stars, each one
with its planets,
satellites and comets,
gas, dust and most of
the so-called dark
Whirlpool Spiral Galaxy
Source: Hubble Space Telescope matter
 Filamentary universe

The groups of galaxies are arranged in

what is called filamentary universe
 It's like the Universe is a bubble
bath where the matter surrounds
the space lacking with galaxies, and
as the time passes the volume that
luck with matter grows

As the Universe expands the space between

clusters of galaxies increases and the
universe dissolves more
Model of the filamentary universe

The clusters and

superclusters of
galaxies lie in the
filaments, like on
the surface of a
bubble.
The model is
coincident with
the observations

Source: Millennium Project Max Planck Institute.

Structure of the universe: synthesis
24

◼ The stars are in clusters.

◼ The stellar clusters are inside the galaxies.
◼ The galaxies form clusters, made of few
galaxies or thousands of them.
◼ The biggest structures in the universe are
filaments, formed by clusters and super
clusters of galaxies.
 Sizes in the Cosmos
We can estimate the
size of one meter,
similar to the size
of a child, and also … distance thousand
a unit thousand times greater, thousand
times greater, one kilometers, can be
kilometer… crossed by plane in
couple of hours.
To get to the Moon we need
three days and to cover the
distance between the Sun and
Jupiter several years.

The distance to nearby stars is

thousand times higher
 Time in the Cosmos in years
Big bang 14 000 000 000
Galaxy formation 13 000 000 000

Solar System formation 4 600 000 000

Appearance of life on Earth 3 800 000 000

Appearance of complex life 500 000 000

Appearance of dinosaurs 350 000 000

The Cretaceous extincion 65 000 000

Appearance of the modern man 120 000

The appearance of the man is very recent

 Observing the universe
You can take an image to determine the position or the
appearance of a star, or the amount light emitted.
The spectra can determine the
speed of the stars. This is what is
known as the Doppler effect of
light.
Analyzing the radiation that stars
and galaxies emit, reflect or absorb,
we learn about their nature.
(Doppler effect)
 Pillars of the Standard Model
Expansion of the universe
Doppler shift to red demonstrates the expansion
(If the stars are close to the observer the light is
bluer and farther they are it is redder).
The groups of galaxies are moving away from
each other and if they are further, they are
moving away at faster rate
Chemical abundances in the universe
In the first minutes of the Cosmos, only H and He
were formed; the expansion stopped the
production: the radiation lost the energy and it was
not possible any more to transform into protons
and neutrons. C, N and O were created inside the
stars and were mixed with the interstellar medium
when the stars died.
 Cosmic Expansion
The space expand, and also the
photons of radiation are
stretched. What in the past were
tiny wavelength gamma rays,
today we observe them as radio
waves.
Measuring the cosmic
expansion, we can calculate
the age of the Universe, 14
billion years. This estimation
is higher than the age
measured for oldest stars
Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) Radiation

◼ The COBE, WMAP

and PLANCK
missions made a
map of the sky of
CMB radiation,
every time with more
details, detecting
small fluctuations:
imprints of lumps of
matter from which
galaxies began to
form
Is there the edge of the universe?
A necessary condition for the
stability of the universe is that
it is in continuous expansion.
Otherwise, it would stop to
exist as we see it now. The
expansion of the universe is
one of the pillars of the
standard model of the Big
Bang
but… there is no centre
of the expansion
Does Gravity dominates the universe?
The Universe
contains mass,so it
has a huge
gravitational force.
Gravity attracts.
The expansion of
the big bang
compensates the
gravity
The universe is accelerating and the source of energy
responsible for that acceleration is unknown.
When observing distant galaxies, we look how they were
in the past. Nearby galaxies are different from the distant
galaxies

Distant galaxies are

Nearby Spiral Galaxy small and amorphous
 Evolution There is a limit
beyond which we do
not have information
about the Cosmos.

We cannot observe the

stars whose light takes
more than fourteen
billion years to reach
us.
If our universe was small we would only
have information about a small section, and
if it was infinite this would be tiny
The INVISIBLE part of the universe,
95% dark matter and dark energy,
is detected due to its action on
VISIBLE objects.

We don’t know the type of material that

it is made off
 Sea surface Bottom of the sea

It’s like we are marine If we look from closer,

biologists, but we can we could discover a great
only see the surface of diversity
the sea
 The dark matter
We know that for every detected astronomical object
there are thousand more which we have no information,
only the mass containing. We do not know its shape and
distribution
It is thought that dark
matter is distributed
filamentary. The blue
shapes are distant
galaxies.
The yellow lines are the
paths of light emitted
by galaxies.
Without dark matter
they would be straight.
The stars move around the
galactic center because its The dark matter is not
mass attracts them. Clusters visible , but can be
of galaxies remain bounded detected through the
due to the gravitational force. gravity

There are objects that move around others that we can

not see. For example, there are stars and groups of stars
that move around the black holes in the center of the
galaxies
 A consortium of more than 200
scientists and 60 institutions in
18 countries of 6 continents are
part of the Event Horizon
Telescope: 8 radio telescopes on
all the Planet

Center of M87, distant 53.5 The first image

million l.y. from the Sun ever taken of a
(credit: NASA/CXC/Villanova University/J.
Neilsen) supermasive
black hole, was
“Shadow” and the event
presented at a
horizon of the supermasive
press conference
black hole in the center of
on April 10th
M87, 6.5 billion times
2019
more massive than our Sun
(credit: Event Horizon Telescope)
 Evolution of the universe
In the long timescales, the universe will continue to
expand. The velocity of the expansion increases with
time, it is accelerated. The energy responsible for this
acceleration is still unknown. We call it dark energy.

After ~trillions of years all interstellar matter will be

consumed and stellar formation will stop.

The protons will disintegrate, and the black holes will

evaporate.

The universe will be immense, populated with exotic

matter and low-energy radio waves.
 Geometry of the universe
depending on the Cosmological constant

Close → >1

Open → <1

Flat→ =1
(predicted by inflationary
theory and coincident with
observations)
The evolution depends of the content of the universe
Cosmological constant Heavy elements
total=1.0
Neutrinos

Stars

Free H
and He

Dark matter
 A Successful Model: The Big Bang
(predictions-verifications)

•Expansion:
verified at the beginning of 20thcentury by E. Hubble.

•Background Cosmic Radiation:

discovered in 20th c. by A. Penzias and R. Wilson.

•Abundance of the Chemical elements:

demonstrated in 20th c.

• Large Scale Structure: discovered at the end of 20th c.

 Final Destiny of the universe
(possible scenarios)

• Big Crunch (reversion of expansion)

• Flat, thermal death (the expansion stops)
• Infinite, flat, in permanent expansion
(this is the scenario now accepted)
• Big Rip (accelerated expansion)

The Future depends on the content of

the universe, on the critical density and
on the existence of dark energy.
Shape and Destiny of the Universe
Accelerated by action
of Dark Energy
Infinite, flat, accelerated
(Big Rip)
expansion, never stops the most probable?)
Universe

Flat, matter dominates the universe, the

expansion is decelerated (thermal death) -
DISCARDED
Size of the

There is a reversion of the expansion (Big

Crunch) –DISCARDED for a moment
Bang
time
To the future
Credit: Daniel Thomas - Mapping the sky
History of the universe
 Epilog
We live in an
extraordinary
epoch in which
we can think
about the
universe using
the physical
laws.

It is possible that with time our ideas change, but

that’s how is science
 Many thanks
for your attention!