Dark Flow: A Mysterious Force From Outside of our Local Universe

When physicists were studying the signature of the cosmic microwave background radiation, which was thrust into existence when our universe was still in diapers, they noted something strange and very unexpected. Clusters of stars were seen traveling at exceptional speed into a narrow expanse of space (about 20 degrees). Indicating that something, but we are not sure of what, is tugging on the galaxies from beyond the scope of the observable universe. Leaving some VERY interesting questions, with equally interesting implications. Could this so-called "dark flow" be evidence of a sister universe, tugging at our own?

Read More: http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/dark-flow/

Image Source (Before Editing): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nasa-dark_flow-large.jpg

10 Amazing Facts About Life, Planets, Stars, and the Universe:

As we all know, the human race lives on a small blue dot, orbiting a yellow-orange star, in a galaxy that we call the Milky Way. This galaxy is some 100,000 light years across, and our closest neighbor (Andromeda) is about 2.5 million light-years away. And while we have been all over the surface of the Earth, we have never visited our sun, have yet to trek across the vast distances of our galaxy, and we still have quite a ways to go before we make it to Andromeda. In fact, we haven"t even finished exploring our own small planet. Ultimately, there is a lot that we don"t know about the cosmos, but what we do know is pretty awesome.

Check out 10 amazing facts at:
http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/10-amazing-facts-about-life-planets-stars-and-the-universe/

Image via NASA

Pareidolia: Clash of the Celestial Space Beasts

When you are laying outstretched on your back, staring into the sunny blue sky on a cloudy day, are you one of those people that see faces, shapes, animals, or other objects in the clouds? I think most of us have seen such things... it"s one of the joys of childhood. However, did you know there is actually a word for this phenomenon? It"s called "pareidolia."

The word itself is derived from the Greek words "para," (meaning something faulty) and eidōlon (meaning image, form, or shape) and is a form of Apophenia, which means "seeing meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data." Except in this case, the patterns seen are fictitious.

See more amazing images of pareidolia at:
http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/pareidolia-clash-of-the-celestial-space-beasts/

Image sources:
NASA/ESA—Chris Keegan

One of the Largest Structures in the Universe:

Astronomers recently discovered a group of active galactic cores that stretch more than 4 billion light-years end to end. The structure is a large quasar group (LQG). And it is simply massive.



For comparison, the Milky Way is about 100,000 light-years across. Our closest neighboring galaxy (Andromeda) is some 2.5 million light-years distant, and it is more than twice the size of the Milky Way (about 260,000 light-years). Which means that this LQG could easily swallow Andromeda, the Milky Way, and all the space in between.

Learn more about this amazing structure and how is impacts the cosmological principle at:
http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/largest-structure-in-the-universe-discovered/

Image source:
NARO

The Problem with Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity:

The quantum realm is rife with enigmas -- inexplicable things that leave us puzzled. Unsurprisingly, since we have the (modest) ambition of obtaining a complete mathematical picture of the entire universe, it seems like there are many properties of particle physics that are completely removed from our existence on Earth. However, that previous sentence is a bit of a paradox, because the quantum world is utterly ingrained into our surroundings. For starters, it can be seen emanating from the sun, as photons of electromagnetism bounce off of everyday objects, before arriving near our retinas. It can also be seen in the form of waves slamming into the shorelines, with the molecules of water slowly eroding large rocks into tiny pebbles of sand. These tiny grains, in turn, accumulate by the trillions, eventually forming the beaches we all love.

In short, we know that the realm of the very small is intricately related to our everyday experiences, and that our level of existence is only a tiny piece of a much larger puzzle. To progress as a species, it is imperative that we have a comprehensive understanding of the world around us.

However, we have had a hard time uniting the physics of the very small with the physics of the very large – Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity. To learn all about this problem, see:
http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/the-problem-with-quantum-mechanics-and-general-relativity/

Image source:
CERN

Cassiopeia A; The Star That Flipped Inside Out

So we"ve seen stars that are literally the size of our solar system, stars that are a brilliant blueish-white color that live short lives and blowup brilliantly, vampire stars that stay young by siphoning material off of their companion, and now we"ve seen a star that turned inside out. Yes... you read that right. Astronomers have found a star that literally turned inside out when it was in its final throws of life. You couldn"t - pardon the french - make this shit up. And lets be honest.. why would you want to? The universe in general tends to surprise us with its abnormalities, and there is always something else to learn from each celestial object we point our telescopes toward.

To find out how this is possible, see: http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/the-end-of-cassiopeia-as-life/

Image Credit: NASA/CXC

The Search for Dark Matter: The Preliminary Results of the LUX Dark Matter Detector

Dark matter: it is a difficult and troubling concept for many who try to understand it. After all, how can something that is so crucial to our existence exist, yet we cannot see it? Well, as a crude analogy, the very air we breathe fits into this same category. We cannot see air, but no one here is disputing the premise that air exists. Of course, this is because we can prove that air is there; however, we were unable to really see or define it for years--for centuries. In fact, we didn"t even discover oxygen (the third most abundant element in the universe that makes up nearly 21% of the earth"s atmosphere) until the 1770s. In a similar way (but using a very different approach than the one used to define air), we have started to get verification for dark matter through the scientific method.

According to our model of cosmology, dark matter is thought to make up 26.8% of the total energy density of the observable universe. This is in stark contrast to regular matter, which comes in at just 4.9%. Subtracted from the total energy density of our homogeneous universe, dark matter would come in at a whopping 84.5% of the total matter of the universe, utterly dominating it. Thus, in order to truly understand the cosmos, we need to define and understand its existence.

To read about dark matter and our quest to understand it, see:
http://www.fromquarkstoquasars.com/the-search-for-dark-matter-the-preliminary-results-of-the-lux-dark-matter-detector/

Image source:
http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/image/april-2012-dark-matter-underground-2