What are some cool facts about the Universe?

 

Here are some mind-blowing facts about the Universe!

1.There is a mass reservoir of water floating in space that is 100,000 times bigger than our sun and holds 140 trillion times more water than all of our oceans.


Two teams of astronomers, each led by scientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), have discovered the biggest water reservoir in the entire universe that is at a distance of 30 billion trillion miles. The water reservoir is at least 140 trillion times that of all the water in the world’s oceans combined, and 100,000 times more massive than the sun. The reason has been attributed to a black hole that is steadily consuming a surrounding disk of gas and dust and in the process is spewing out water vapors.

2. The average color of the universe is beigeish white, and is named “Cosmic Latte”


A team of astronomers from Johns Hopkins University in 2001 determined that the color of the universe is greenish white. However, they later corrected their analysis in a 2002 paper in which they acknowledged that the color was in fact beigeish white in place of greenish white. This average color of the universe has been named as “Cosmic Latte”. The survey took into account more than 200,000 galaxies and measured the spectral range of the light from a large volume of the universe. The RGB value of Cosmic Latte is #FFF8E7.

3. The largest object in the universe has a mean size of 6-10 billion light years and theoretically shouldn’t even exist


The biggest structure ever found in the entire universe has a mean size in excess of 6 to 10 billion light-years. Named as Hercules-Corona Borealis Great Wall (Her-CrB GW), the structure is larger than the theoretical upper limit on how big universal structures can be. Therefore, it technically shouldn’t exist. The structure was discovered in early November 2013 by a team of American and Hungarian astronomers led by Istvan Horvath, Jon Hakkila and Zsolt Bagoly while analyzing data from the Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Mission

4. There is a large area of space that is devoid of any galaxies that has been theorized by cosmologist Laura Mersini-Houghton, to be the imprint of a parallel universe.


The CMB (Cosmic Microwave Background) Cold Spot is a region of space in the direction of the Eridanus constellation that was first discovered in 2004. It is postulated as one of the largest structures in the observable universe and is often described as a bubble of cold space in the cosmos. According to Laura Mersini-Houghton, this cold spot represents an imprint of a parallel universe caused by quantum entanglement between the two universes before they were separated by cosmic inflation. If true, this represents the presence of a universe in conjuction with ours.

5. Gamma ray bursts. Every once and a while a dying star will let off a concentrated beam of gamma radiation. If it hit the earth, it’d kill just about everything. Since the radiation travels at the speed of light, there’d be literally no warning.


Gamma ray bursts are high-powered beams of gamma radiations that are emitted when the core of a massive star collapses to form a black hole. These gamma radiations can produce raw energy greater than what Sun can produce in its entire lifetime. The beams are extremely energetic and can destroy everything in its path, although these have to be aimed at an object directly. Talking about Earth, if these Gamma beams did hit Earth, they may as well cause a mass extinction of human race or even a short burst of these radiations lasting for a mere 10 seconds would pulverize 25% of our Ozone layer thereby, sending Ultraviolet rays in enormous quantities to Earth.

6. There is an object in universe which is pulling the Milky Way Galaxy and millions of other galaxies towards it at 14 million mph.


There is a cluster of galaxies called ACO 3627- previously known as Norma Cluster- that is located near the center of a large mass which is known as “The Great Attractor”. The great attractor is so large that it pulls our own Milky Way Galaxy and millions of other galaxies towards it. Many of the galaxies in the ACO 3627 galaxy cluster are slowly heading towards collision with each other. The galaxy cluster has more than 8000 galaxies and with a total mass more than ten million billion times the mass of the Sun.

7. There is a planet “Gliese 436b”, which is covered in burning ice.


In 2007 an exoplanet named Gliese 436b was discovered. It orbits the red dwarf Gliese 436 and its size is the same as planet Neptune. The temperature of this planet is 712 K (439 degrees C) which indicates that this planet is very close to its star. This high temperature indicates that water in any form could not exist on its surface. But, this planet breaks all rules by being covered in ice, solid ice. This exotic form of water ice is known as “Ice-x” which covers a rocky core. This ice is unlike any other as it can remain solid even during the super hot temperature of 439 degrees. The immense gravity of this planet compresses the water molecules and turns it into ice. Its extreme gravity also prevents the ice from turning back into liquid form.

ΑΝΑΔΗΜΟΣΙΕΥΣΗ ΑΠΟ ΤΟ QUORA 21/6/2017