Solving the Big Bang’s Issues

We are bounded in a nutshell of Infinite Space: Week 8: Free Form #10: Solving the Big Bang’s Issues

As we mentioned just a bit ago, the Big Bang theory has some clear problems, now it’s time to understand what these are. First off, there is the Horizon problem, which come from direct information received from the CMB. Here, astronomers measured points from the CMB in all different directions, and found the SAME, EXACT information, the same temperature, redshift, density population, number count, and beyond. This is confounding on account of the fact that for this type of uniformity to occur, all the points of the CMB need to be in contact with one another in the extremely early universe, in order for the information to be consistent. However, under the past Big Bang Model, this was impossible considering the size of the universe when it released the CMB is large enough for the light cones (the possibility of the light of each point at a point earlier in time) of the points measured to have met with each other and exchanged data.

The other clear problem with the Big Bang is the unlikelihood of our living in a Flat Universe, as opposed to a closed or open universe. As we saw in http://ay16-rodrigocordova.blogspot.com/2015/11/turns-out-euclid-was-right-about-math.html , there are several geometric configurations which could have described the ultimate fate of the universe, these being an open case (where the universe would expand endlessly, and quick enough that halos would not have formed in the early universe and thus galaxies would have never emerged), the closed universe (a continuous expansion and contraction of the universe, in a cyclic manner), and a flat case, which leaves the possibility of several types of expansion. We, according to many tests done on the CMB, live in a flat universe and thus also live in a precarious state of universal geometry which effectively allows for us to be now pondering these questions. How then, are we in such an unlikely state?

These two problems characterize the main issues we have observed in the universe (not based on theory and things we do not see, as is the case of the theorized but unperceived magnetic monopoles), the same problems astrophysicists and cosmologists worked to find a solution. Thanks to the work of Alan Guth, Andrei Linde, Paul Steinhardt, and Andy Albrecht, the theory of inflation was created. Inflation postulated that at a point after Planck Time (when gravity separated from the other Fundamental Forces, described by the only definition of the fundamental constants which make a time unit: ) \[ t_P = \sqrt{\frac{hG}{c^5}} = 5.6 \times 10^{-44} s\] there was a massive expansion of the order \(10^{40\sim 50}\) which straightened the universe into being flat (same way one would stretch out a piece of paper) and was early and quick enough to spread the initial information of the universe all across the CMB. This meant the universe went through an expansion from being \(10^{-28} m \) in length to being 0.73 meters in the span of \(10^{-36} s\), the most aggressive and rapid expansion in the history of the universe. 

References: 

Carroll, B. W., & Ostlie, D. A. (2007). An Introduction to Modern Astrophysics. San Francisco: Pearson: Addison Wesley.

Images from: http://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2013/03/planck_cmb/12583930-4-eng-GB/Planck_CMB.jpg

http://media.radiosai.org/journals/Vol_05/01JUL07/images/FeatureArticles/sifi/Fig-4.jpg