The first 100 Million Years
This December's
Discover magazine
has an article by Tim Folger,
about some cosmological universe simulation program that Tom Abel
is using to research what it was like for some time after the Big
Bang. Apparently, there was about 100 million years of a dark but
expanding universe, mostly clouds of hydrogen. Then finally the
hydrogen clouds coalesced into huge super-stars, which were so big
that they burned fast, fused most of the heavier elements, blew
up, and ... well, after a while, the more normal-sized stars,
galaxies, and black holes started forming.
So I wonder ... Where'd the hydrogen come from? Just loose protons
capturing loose electrons? Did these huge super-stars leave behind
black holes when they blew up? Were those the nuclei of the galaxies
we see out there?
When I was young, the only subatomic particles we knew
about were protons, neutrons, and electrons. Then they
discovered quarks and other teeny, short-lived particles.
But I wonder how often those things "matter" in the real
universe. Can simulations like Abel's ignore the "weird"
particles and just model the big clouds of hydrogen
with mostly classical physics?
Inquiring minds want to know!
9:40:21 PM
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