The Early Universe

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

We are fortunanate here in Gove to be having a presentation this friday night by Prof. Ray Norris who works for the CSIRO at the "Australia Telescope"
As an Astrophysicist Prof. Norris specializes in the study of the Early Universe & is a key player in Australias bid to have the "Square Kilometer Array" (radio Telescope) built in Australia.
We are all looking forward to an interesting & informative evening
All iceincspacers welcome

[iceman (Mike)]

Nice Ian, sounds like it will be a very interesting talk! Look forward to reading the reports afterwards.

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

Well, we had a great presentation from Prof. Ray Norris this evening.
To a packed room of 40+ people, Prof. Norris showed our place in the universe & made clear the science behind the model of the unerverse that we understand today.
It seems that the evidence points to a universe that will expand to the point where in 10 to the 100 BILLION years (thats a long time) there will be NOTHING LEFT ! Not even black holes.
That observational (Optical, Infra red, radio etc ) Astronomy can tell us that, is nothing short of Amazing !
We finished the night of with a sample of viewing Globs, open clusters, Nebulas & Mars
This was quite unusual for Prof. Norris as he spends most of his observing time behind computer screens !
We look forward to seeing Prof Norris when he returns to Gove next dry season.

[Starkler (Geoff)]

So what happens to all the matter in the universe then ?

[Chrissyo (Chris)]

Would it just get so stretched that nothing would be able to take an obvious shape?

[gaa_ian (Ian)]

The Ultimate fate of the universe in a cold dark decay, is modeled around such concepts as Proton Decay destroying matter & Hawking radiation seeing even the demise of black holes.
However the last slide of his presentation said:
"BUT THEN AGAIN, WE COULD BE WRONG"
An important cavait to any scientific theory, however well supported by evidence.