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The Big Bang Theory
The Big Bang Theory
The most common theory about how the Universe began is that it all started with a Big Bang.
The Big Bang Theory is a theory explaining...
The Big Bang Theory states that around 13.8 billion years ago all the matter in the universe was concentrated into a single incredibly tiny point. This began to enlarge rapidly in a hot explosion, and it is still expanding today!
The Big Bang caused expansion and cooling. Which statements do you think are true about the universe before the Big Bang?
You can select multiple answers
Before the Big Bang, the universe was condensed into an infinitely small, dense, and hot point. The only space that exists is the space the Big Bang created. Mind-boggling!
The diagram shows a timeline of events after the big bang.
The first seconds after the big bang saw the birth of subatomic particles which, in time, would form atoms.
Which two subatomic particles would later form the nucleus of an atom?
After around 3 seconds, protons and neutrons came together to form the nuclei of simple elements.
At this time, all of the matter in the universe was a mixture of 75% hydrogen and 25% helium.
The image above shows the nucleus of a helium atom, formed when 2 hydrogen nuclei collide and combine. How many protons and neutrons did each of those two hydrogen nuclei have?
years after the Big Bang, electrons bind with nuclei and form atoms. This is because...
A) the temperature remained the same. B) the temperature dropped. C) the temperature increased.
Answer A, B or C.
Around 300,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe had cooled to about 3000 degrees Celsius.
Electrons could finally bind with atomic nuclei to form atoms.
Approximately how many billions of years after the Big Bang was our sun formed?
It might surprise you that it wasn't until approximately 9 billion years after the Big Bang that our sun and solar system formed!
That marks the beginning of the universe as we know it today.
If the Big Bang happened around 13.8 billion years ago, and our sun formed 9 billion years later, how many billion years old is our sun?
This timeline gives you an idea of just how old our universe is compared to us humans, and how long it took for life as we know it to form!
The Big Bang is thought to have been a huge, hot and fast explosion, and it took billions of years of cooling and expansion afterwards before matter as we know it formed.
As well as atoms, matter, galaxies, planets and stars forming, what else happened in the billions of years after the Big Bang? Pick all the options you think are correct.
You can select multiple answers
There are various theories about the beginning of the universe. The Big Bang Theory is just one of them. Why do we call it a theory?
There is evidence to support the Big Bang Theory, yet we cannot really know for sure whether or not it is correct. It is however, a theory that is widely accepted to be true amongst scientists.