The Beginning Of Earth

Robert Pollikett April 25, 2019

There Is More To Creation Than Meets The Eye

Time is a concept of mankind to explain our existence in the space of our material realm. Time is not really linear and can be bent accordingly to the space-time continuum. Even in the bible a thousand years is nothing more than a day to God. The entity of God is not restricted by time because it is omnipresent.

There are two known realms of existence, the spiritual realm and our material realm. Time in the spiritual realm is of little consequence for their life is of servitude and is restricted by God. Within the material realm it is thought, that with inter dimensional travel using wormholes, one can arrive at a point in time before they left or even come back at the same age after many years of travelling. So in the scheme of things, time is irrelevant.

Creation according to Genesis in the bible is a simple explanation handed down by word of mouth for many years before it was written. It is a simple explanation for people who had little knowledge of the world around them. The creation story also gave the Hebrew people a concept of time and religion, and made the Sabbath day the focal point of both. The creation story also established calendation and the understanding of our seasons. Through calendation the Sabbath days were set according to the moon and separated by the days of the sun.

The sun and the moon are critical to life on Earth. The sun determines the days and years whilst the moon governs the night, months, seasons and festivities.

This knowledge served mankind well for thousands of years, but was lost when the Church of Rome changed calendation, (for their own religious practices), from the lunar solar calendar to the pagan, Roman Julian seven-day solar calendar. The religious practices for both the Jew and those of the Way, was changed dramatically and the Sabbath day and its true understanding was lost over time.

But creation is also about cause and effect. Everything is done for a reason, mainly about acceptance and understanding. The bible is actually a love story about the consequences of ones actions, the rejection of God and Gods love for humanity and the advent of the Messiah. God is love, and for the sake of humanity our universe was lovingly made and planet Earth was formed in the perfect spot for our habitation.

From Dust We Came

Around 400 to 700 million years after the Big Bang, 13.399 to 13.099 billion years ago (Bya), Galaxy Clusters and Superclusters started to emerge from the collapse of a giant nebula which consisted mostly of hydrogen and helium. By about 12.6 Bya these ancient galaxy clusters started to evolve into our modern Milky Way galaxy. Organised chaos prevailed.

Our Milky Way’s thin disc started to form 8.8 Bya. It is thought that the Milky Way may have collided with a smaller satellite galaxy, causing the stars in the thin disk to be shaken up and creating the thick disc, while the gas would have settled into the galactic plane and reformed the thin disc. Then by about 8 Bya, the Milky Way’s star formation rate began to decline.

Our Milky Way Galaxy formed into a typical barred spiral galaxy with a diameter between 150,000 and 200,000 light years. It is estimated to contain 100 to 400 billion stars and more than 100 billion planets. The Milky Way has several satellite galaxies and is part of the Local Group of galaxies, which forms part of the Virgo Supercluster, which is itself, a component of the Laniakea Supercluster. The distance between the local arm of our galaxy, (Milky Way) and the next arm out, the Perseus Arm, is about 6,500 light years.

The Chaotian Eon/Era is an unofficial time period used to denote the formation of our solar system and the beginning of the formation of Earth after the collision of two Proto-planets. The Chaotian Eon/Era is named after Chaos, (the primeval void in Greek mythology) and covers a time period between about 4.6 and 4.54 Bya.

Around 4.603 Bya our Solar System came about when our early Sun started to form. It is now thought that a nearby star became a supernova and the shock wave caused the solar nebula to contract and rotate. Gravity and inertia then flattened the nebula cloud into a disc perpendicular to its axis of rotation. The nebula mass then started to concentrate in the middle of the disc and heat up. Nuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium started to take place and formed our early sun as a T Tauri star. A vast disc of debris, dust and gas began to form around the early Sun.

As our T Tauri star condensed and heated more by nuclear fusion, the resulting T Tauri solar winds would have cleared out most of the material in the disc that had not already condensed and coalesced into larger bodies forming balls of rock and dust.

Violent collisions occurred. Protoplanets, asteroids and comets start to form in the Sun’s protoplanetary disc. Our Sun over time formed into a G-type main-sequence (Population I) star. It is a nearly a perfect sphere of hot plasma, with internal convective motion that generates a magnetic field via a dynamo process.

Our Sun lies close to the inner rim of the Milky Way’s Orion Arm, in the Local Interstellar Cloud or the Gould Belt at a distance of 25,000 to 28,000 light years from the Galactic Centre. The Sun is contained within the Local Bubble, (a space of rarefied hot gas), which was possibly produced by the supernova remnant Geminga or multiple supernovae in subgroup B1 of the Pleiades moving group. The Sun and our Solar System is found in the galactic habitable zone. It takes our Solar System about 225 to 250 million years, (a galactic year), to complete one orbit through the Milky Way.

The Beginning Of Earth

Our Sun has eight known planets. This includes four terrestrial planets such as Mercury (4.503 Bya), Venus (4.6 Bya), Earth (4.54 Bya) and Mars (4.6 Bya). There are also two gas giants, Jupiter (4.503 Bya) and Saturn (4.503 Bya), plus two ice giants, Uranus (4.503 Bya) and Neptune (4.503 Bya). Our Solar System also has at least five dwarf planets, an asteroid belt, numerous comets, and a large number of icy bodies, which lie beyond the orbit of Neptune.

From a violent beginning, (in a time of turmoil), our planet Earth came about. Around 4.56 Bya, Proto-planets such as Gaia (Geb or Keb) and Theia formed in the Sun’s protoplanetary disc about 150 million kilometres away from the Sun. Their atmospheres would have contained gas molecules of carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and sulphur (S). And due to frequent collisions with other bodies in space there would have been extreme volcanism causing their surfaces to be molten.

Theia was a Mars sized planetoid with a mass 10% of that of Earth’s. Its orbit at first may have been stable but destabilized as Gaia (Geb or Keb) increased its mass by the accretion of more and more material. Then about 4.543 Bya, Theia impacted Gaia (Geb or Keb) with a glancing blow, colliding at slow speed and at a low oblique angle. Gaia (Geb or Keb) was not totally destroyed, but a large portion of its crust and mantle was ejected into space.

Gaia was shattered and Thea was lost. The combined debris of both Proto-planets started to reform due to gravitational force. The Solar winds would have swept the smaller and lighter hydrogen and helium molecules closer to the sun leaving the heavier elements to spiral and coalesced surrounding matter to form into a sphere.

We are now about to enter the Hadean Eon/Era, (although it isn’t formally recognized), about 4.54 Bya. (Hadeon is a reference to Hades, a Greek translation of the Hebrew word for hell). It marks the era of the formation of planet Earth and its moon. Earths surface at first was unstable due to vulcanisation but later cooled down for rock formation. But during the end of the Hadean period, the late heavy bombardment stage commenced. At the end of the Hadean Eon/Era, (about 3.8 Bya), planet Earth could settle down as the Archean Eon/Era began.

Hadean Earth

From the coalesced debris of both Gaia and Theia our Earth formed around 4.54 Bya and became the third planet from the Sun. It is thought that the impact caused Earth to reform with a changed axis and develop a large 23.5° axial tilt with a quicker rotation. The early atmosphere of Earth contained carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and sulphur (S) and almost no oxygen (O). Much of its surface was molten due to extreme volcanism and by the bombarded of material left over from the formation of the solar system.

Early Earth is thought to have grown by accretion until its interior was hot enough to melt the heavy siderophils metals. The heaviest material such iron (Fe) and zinc (Zn) then began to sink to the core whilst the lighter silicate material remained on top to form a crust. This resulted in the separation of a primitive mantle and a metallic core in only 10 million years after Earth’s formation.

The heavier elements would have sunk to the centre of Earth while lighter ones rose to the surface. This separation of material not only produced the layered structure of Earth; it also set up the formation of Earth’s magnetic field due to the resultant convection currents.

Then about 4.53 Bya a very large number of moonlets, which were sent into orbit around the young Earth after the Theia impact, and other coalesced debris, (mainly from Theia), formed into our Moon. Earth’s gravitational pull caught the moon and pulled it into its current orbit.

Also, the gravitational pull of the new Moon stabilised the Earth’s fluctuating axis of rotation. It also set up the conditions in which abiogenesis occurred and allowed for the development of Earth’s seasons. The Moon is Earth’s only natural satellite and is the fifth largest natural satellite in our solar system.

Back on Earth there is no life. Temperatures are extremely hot, with frequent volcanic activity and hellish environments due to large impacts of solar debris. Earth had a very hot and dense nebular type steaming atmosphere of hydrogen, carbon dioxide (CO²), nitrogen (N), sulphur dioxide (SO²) and small amounts of ammonia (NH³) and methane (CH⁴), but no oxygen (O). As Earth developed its magnetic field, it started to deflect the solar winds giving Earth a more stable atmosphere.

Then approximately 100 million years after the Earth formed, its temperatures stabilised enough for a crust to form and survive. The atmosphere was still hot, heavy and toxic due to volcanic activity, but Earth was starting to cool down. It has been suggest that the inner core of Earth had a solid centre and was starting to become distinct from the liquid outer core.

As the solid inner core heated the outer liquid layer, stronger convection currents were produced and Earth’s magnetic field increased. This also helped to change Earths atmosphere as volcanic activity continued. The sun by now was emitting only 70% of its current power, but due to no ozone layer, ultraviolet radiation would have flooded Earths surface.

Crusted Earth

When Earth was about 40% of its present radius, its magnetic field and gravitational attraction allowed the retention of an atmosphere, which included water.

The temperature of Earth cooled dramatically within 150 million years, which allowed the formation of a solid surface crust. Further impacts of space debris caused localized melting of rock and partial differentiation due to chemical reaction with some lighter elements on the surface or releasing them to the moist atmosphere. It is thought that Zircon and water first appeared on Earth about 4.404 Bya.

The Zirconian Era, (considered to be about 4.4 to about 4.1 Bya), is defined by the occurrence of the first types of minerals and rock that formed and were sustained on Earth. Zircon is the oldest known mineral. The zircon found in the Jack Hills of Narryer Gneiss Terrane in Western Australia, (Yilgarn craton), was dated as being formed 4.404 Bya. It appears that these zircon crystals formed in the presence of liquid water, possibly an ocean.

The oldest rocks known are the faux amphibolite volcanic deposits of the Nuvvuagittuq greenstone belt in Quebec, Canada. The zircon in them is believed to be from the Hadean crust and was melted into the parent rock, they have been estimated to have formed 4.28 Bya.

An xenolith, (foreign rock), is a rock fragment that becomes enveloped in a larger rock during the latter’s development and solidification. A xenocryst is an individual foreign crystal included within an igneous body. Examples of xenocrysts are quartz crystals in a silica-deficient lava and diamonds within kimberlite diatremes.

In the Guiana shield from the Iwokrama Formation of southern Guyana, zircon cores were found and have been dated to about 4.22 Bya. These appear to be an intrusion of minerals into rock due to pressure.

No one knows for sure when the first outer crust of the planet actually formed. However, due to grains of zircon being dated to about 4.4 billion years ago a reasonable indication is given of stable continents and liquid water on the Earths surface by this time. The surface temperature at this time was probably less than 100°C (212°F). Over time nearly all of this original “Hadean” crust was subducted due to the movements of tectonic plates and only a few rocks and minerals remain from this interval.

Planetoid debris periodically collided with Earth. These incoming bodies would vaporize on impact and cause impact degassing, many volatiles were delivered and the solid matter built the crust by accretion. Volcanic activity was also intense.

Hence either hydrogen molecules or minerals on the surface of Earth would have bound any free oxygen molecules. The movement of the tectonic plates would have been affected by the impact of planetoid debris and the magnetic field of the Earth. The ice from the odd comet that impacted added water to the Earth’s surface and early oceans. All this in turn would have created a new atmosphere as the greenhouse effect was reduced.

It has been proposed that ammonia (NH³), methane (CH⁴), carbon dioxide (CO²), nitrogen (N) and neon (Ne) were present sometime after the crust cooled, whilst volcanic out gassing added water vapour, nitrogen and additional hydrogen. All this started to form a new atmosphere.

It is also thought that the inner core of Earth had a solid centre now distinct from the liquid outer core. The inner core was now starting to freeze and grow out of the liquid outer core because Earth’s interior had gradually cooled at a rate of about 100 degrees Celsius per billion years. As the Earth cooled, clouds started to form. The resultant rain then helped create and increase the oceans of water on the surface of Earth.

As the surface of Earth continually reshaped itself over hundreds of millions of years due to tectonic plate activity, large landmasses formed continents and then broke up again, whilst others migrated across the surface of Earth. The migrating continents occasionally combined to form a supercontinent.

The tectonic plate activity also encouraged super volcanic activity, which would have caused atmosphere gas levels to oscillate widely. However, the carbon dioxide, (CO²), in the atmosphere due to lava and rock vaporization, would have been dissolved by the oceans over time. And over time Earth would begin to harbour life, the only known astronomical object to do so to date.

Bombardment Of Earth

From 4.1 to 3.8 Bya, planet Earth, our Moon and other planets in our solar system, including Mercury, Venus and Mars underwent a period of heavy asteroid and meteorite bombardment. As Earth was hit, steam escaped from the crust, volcanic activity increased, which in turn released more gases and all this completed the second atmosphere.

The numerous asteroid impacts during the Late Heavy Bombardment caused significant changes to the greater surface environment of the inner planets of our solar system, including our Earth and Moon. Comets were originally far more common in the inner parts of the solar system than they are today. Because of this they also contributed in the Late Heavy Bombardment and through the dissolving of their ice, more gases and water were added to our atmosphere.

Also additional water may have been imported by bolide collisions, probably from asteroids ejected from the outer asteroid belt under the influence of Jupiter’s gravity. Hence our oceans increased in size.

During this time our planet Earth was bombarded all over by meteorites, asteroids, comets and other foreign objects non-stop. Did these collisions spark the chemical building blocks for life?

Thermal flux from widespread hydrothermal activity may have been conducive to abiogenesis and life’s early diversification. The remains of biotic life were found in 4.1 billion-year-old rocks in Western Australia. Was this the beginning of the chemistry of life? Did the organic chemical components of the building blocks of life, (amino acids, RNA and DNA), first appear then?

As the Late Heavy Bombardment drew to a close the Archean Eon/Era began. Our sun was still fainter that it is today and planet Earth had cooled down even more.

Hence more clouds and rain occurred, the oceans expanded and soon “Vaalbara” would become Earth’s first known supercontinent. It was during the Archeon Eon/Era that the first life forms evolved. Our moon, although battered, was still in orbit around Earth and it stabilized the Earth from wobbling. Planet Earth was still tilted on its axis and the designated four seasons evolved.

The Late Heavy Bombardment helped clean out the early space debris and most of the comets today are in orbits farther away from the Sun than Neptune. Although due the mechanics of our universe and solar system, planet Earth is still being visited by the occasional meteorite, asteroid and comet.

Our Earth

Regardless how you view the creation of our planet Earth, (either through biblical creation or the evolution of our universe and solar system), planet Earth is a miraculous creation. Soon, the argument of life begins with the next stage of Earth’s development, the Archean Eon/Era.

Since God is omnipresent and not restricted by our concept of time, maybe the reality of the creation of our universe, solar system and planet Earth is a combination of both stories. Through God, nothing is impossible. The understanding of truth is up to the individual. Seek God to find the truth. The truth that you are willing to accept depends upon your knowledge and understanding at any given point of time in your life.

But one thing is for sure! You cannot deny the existence of planet Earth.

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Our Neighbourhood

Robert Pollikett February 3, 2019

Love thy neighbour. It’s good advice if you want to get along with people.

But going into a new neighbourhood can be rather daunting. Buying off the plan can be risky for things can change quickly. Will the proper amenities be in place? Are the neighbours congenial? Would a population explosion ruin your dreams?

How would it be if some entity designed your neighbourhood to suite your life style for a particular time in the future. And started to do this billions of years before your particular species of animal came into being. That would take a lot of thought and will power to even comprehend it.

But it did happen. You want proof! Just look at the heavens on a clear night sky. Have you looked at the lights above? They are our neighbours. There are millions of millions of them and they form our galactic neighbourhood.

Our neighbourhood took billions of years for its boundaries to be established. There was (and still is) a lot of construction going on, dust and debris everywhere.

So! Here is a timeline story of how our cosmos neighbourhood came about…

By The Plan

It started with the stars, theoretically with Population III type stars and knowingly with Population II type stars. It is thought that all the Population III type stars and some of the Population II type stars ended their life in supernova. The ejecta of the supernova and other primordial gas, dust and debris within a particular area of our universe formed into nebula.

The various nebula formations throughout the universe enlarged over time. Their mass and gravity increased. Eventually these clumps of dust and gases got so big that it collapses from their own gravity. The collapse caused the material at the centre of the nebular cloud to heat up. This hot core could be the beginning of either Population Type I stars, (modern stars), or form into protoplanets, planets and planetoids, all depending upon situation.

About 100 million years after the Big Bang, 13.699 billion years ago (Bya), the Gravitational collapse of ordinary matter particles started to fall into structures created by dark matter. Quasars begin to take shape as the gaseous accretion forms discs around black holes. As the gas falls toward a black hole, energy is released in the form of electromagnetic radiation. Population III (Pop III) stars were starting to form. They were very hot and had a short lifetime. Their ultraviolet light started to ionize the remaining neutral hydrogen gas in the early universe.

About 200 million years after the Big Bang, (13.599 Bya), HD 140283 formed. It is know as the “Methuselah” Star. Methuselah is a metal poor sub-giant, Population II Type Star, about 200 light years away from the Earth in the constellation Libra, (specifically towards the Ophiuchus constellation). This Population II star is the unconfirmed oldest star observed in the Universe.

The oldest known star is SMSS J031300.36-670839.3 and it formed approximately 13.6 Bya . It is a star in the constellation Hydrus and is 6,000 light years from Earth.

HE 1327-2326 is an early Population II undeveloped star. It is iron poor and formed in the constellation Hydra. It was made from material that was chemically enriched by a first-generation Population III supernova.

Around 300 million years after the Big Bang (13.499 Bya) the first large-scale astronomical objects, such as protogalaxies and quasars are thought to have begun forming. During this time period Population III (Pop III) stars continued to burn and stellar nucleosynthesis operated. At first they were fusing hydrogen to produce more helium, then over time these Pop III stars were forced to fuse helium to produce carbon, oxygen, silicon and other heavy elements up to iron on the periodic table.

These new elements seeded into neighbouring gas clouds, (nebula), by the supernova of Pop III stars. This in turn led to the formation of more Population II stars (metal poor) and gas giants in the early universe through gravitational collapse.

It is also thought that Population II stars through their own nuclear fusion and supernovas created all the other elements in the periodic table, except for the more unstable ones. An interesting characteristic of Population II (Pop II) stars is that despite their lower overall metallicity, they often have a higher ratio of alpha elements (O, Si, Ne, etc) relative to Fe as compared to Population I stars.

Under Construction

About 299 million years after the Big Bang (about 13.5 Bya) ancient galaxy clusters started to come together as the building blocks of our Milky Way galaxy.

The early universe started to become transparent to ultraviolet light for the first time. Due to mass star formation the early universe starts to heat once again.

Around 400 to 700 million years after the Big Bang (13. 399 to 13.099 Bya) Galaxy Clusters and Superclusters started to emerge. Our galactic neighbourhood starts to take shape.

380 million years after the Big Bang (13.419 Bya) the oldest known quasar (UDFj-39546284) formed in the constellation Fornax.

400 million years after the Big Bang (13.399 Bya) GN-z11, the oldest-known galaxy, formed. GN-z11 is a high redshift (z = 11.09+0.08; −0.12) galaxy found in the constellation Ursa Major.

420 million years after the Big Bang (13.379 Bya) the quasar MACS0647-JD formed in the constellation Camelopardalis. It is the furthest known quasar and it has a high redshift (z = 10.7 – 11).

529 million years after the Big Bang (13.27 Bya) Messier 77 (M77 or NGC 1068), formed. It is a barred spiral type galaxy about 47 million light years away in the constellation Cetus.

570 million years after the Big Bang (13.229 Bya) EGSY8p7 a high redshift (z = 8.68) galaxy formed in the constellation Boötes.

About 630 million years after the Big Bang (13.169 Bya) GRB 090423 occurred. It was the oldest ever observed gamma ray burst.

669 million years after the Big Bang (13.13 Bya) EGS-zs8-1 a high redshift (z = 7.7) Lyman-break type galaxy formed in the northern constellation of Boötes.

699 million years after the Big Bang (13.1 Bya) z8_GND_5296 a dwarf high redshift (z = 7.5078) Lyman-alpha type galaxy formed in the constellation Ursa Major.

750 million years after the Big Bang (13.049 Bya) GN-108036 a redshift (z = 7.2) galaxy formed in the constellation Ursa Major.

889 million years after the Big Bang (12.91 Bya) SXDF-NB1006-2 a redshift (z = 7.213) galaxy formed in the Cetus constellation.

900 million years after the Big Bang (12.899 Bya) SDSS J0100+2802, a hyperluminous quasar, formed near the border of the constellations Pisces and Andromeda. It has a redshift of z = 6.30, which corresponds to a distance of 12.8 billion light years from Earth. It harbours a massive black hole with mass of 12 billion solar masses.

919 million years after the Big Bang (12.88 Bya) IOK-1 a redshift (z = 6.96) galaxy formed in the constellation Coma Berenices.

949 million years after the Big Bang (12.85 Bya) – the oldest known Quasar CFHQS J2329-0301 came into existence.

999 million years after the Big Bang (12.8 Bya) Galaxy HCM-6A, the most distant normal galaxy observed started to form. HCM-6A is located behind the Abell 370 galactic cluster, near M77 in the constellation Cetus.

The early universe gradually transitioned into our known observable universe as seen today. The Dark Age came to an end at about 1 billion years after the Big Bang (12.799 Bya) as the Reionization Era ended due to the early universe becoming ionized. The cosmos is going to plan. The road map is now observable.

The Developing Neighbourhood

Our universe is still small in size and galaxy interactions become common. Larger and larger galaxies start to form out of the galaxy merger process. The first galaxy clusters and galaxy superclusters start to appear. Our modern looking galaxies start to form and develop.

1.099 billion years after the Big Bang (12.7 Bya) the oldest known exoplanet PSR B1620-26 b formed in the constellation of Scorpius, in the centre of the Milky Way. The planet is in a circumbinary orbit around the two stars of PSR B1620-26 [which are a pulsar (PSR B1620-26 A) and a white dwarf (WD B1620 26)]. PSR B1620-26 b is 12,400 light years away from Earth.

12.6 Bya – the ancient galaxy clusters started to evolve into our modern Milky Way galaxy.

11 to 12.76 Bya – Kapteyn’s Star formed. It is a class M1 dim red subdwarf or main sequence halo star, which is thought to be originally a member of the Milky Way galaxy’s luminous halo. It is 12.76 light years from Earth in the southern constellation Pictor. Although Kapteyn’s Star is the closest halo star to our Solar System it is moving away from it. It has two known planets in orbit, Kapteyn b and Kapteyn c.

11.7 Bya – The Milky Way’s inner halo formed. It is the region surrounding the galaxy’s familiar spiral-armed disc.

11.53 Bya – Omega Centauri formed. It is a globular cluster in the constellation of Centaurus at a distance of 15,800 light years form Earth. Omega Centauri is the largest globular cluster in the Milky Way with a diameter of roughly 150 light years.

11.23 Bya – Kepler-444 formed. It is an orange main sequence star, approximately 116 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Lyra of the Milky Way. The Kepler-444 system consists of a pair of M-dwarf stars and five rocky exoplanets, Kepler-444b, Kepler-444c, Kepler-444d, Kepler-444e and Kepler-444f.

11 Bya – Kapteyn b formed and is a possible exoplanet that orbits within the habitable zone of the red subdwarf Kapteyn’s star.

11 Bya – The Star formation rate peaks and the Universe starts to cool.

Note: A new study suggests that half of all stars that have ever existed were born in a boom between 11 billion and 9 billion years ago. Star formation since then has been on the decline, even up to now.

11 to 7 Bya – The Gliese 581 system formed in the Libra constellation of the Milky Way. It is a gravitationally bound system comprising the star Gliese 581, (a red dwarf), and the objects that orbit it. The system is known to consist of at least four planets, Gliese 581b, Gliese 581c and Gliese 581e along with a debris disc. It has two unconfirmed planets Gliese 581g and Gliese 581d. The Gliese 581 star is 20.5 light years from Earth.

10.74 Bya – Lacaille 9352 (Lac 9352) formed. It is a main sequence, red dwarf star in the southern constellation of Piscis Austrinus.

10.7 Bya – the oldest known spiral galaxy BX442 formed in the constellation Pegasus. BX442 is a grand design spiral galaxy of type Sc. It has a companion dwarf galaxy. It is the most distant known grand design spiral galaxy in the universe, with a redshift of z = 2.1765 ± 0.0001.

10 Bya – A galactic merger occurred between an unknown galaxy and the Milky Way. The Milky Ways halo was bulked up on a diet of baby star clusters. These stars were mainly Population II (POP II) stars.

10 Bya – Population I (POP I) stars started to form. They are the first metal abundant stars. POP I stars are also the beginning of life friendly stars.

10 Bya – The Andromeda Galaxy (Messier 31), in the constellation of Andromeda, was formed by a colossal crash between two protogalaxies.

About 10 Bya – Barnard’s star forms. Barnard’s Star is a very low mass red subdwarf star, about 6 light years away from Earth in the constellation of Ophiuchus in the Milky Way galaxy. It is the fourth-nearest known individual star to the Sun and the closest star in the Northern Celestial Hemisphere.

Between 1 and 10 Bya – WISE 0855−0714 formed. It is a sub-brown dwarf star, 7.27 ±0.13 light years from Earth and is located in the constellation Hydra.

9.98 Bya – the oldest galactic cluster JKCS 041 forms. It is a cluster galaxy of 19 members in the constellation Cetus. JKCS 041 is estimated to be 9.9 billion light years away from Earth, (the farthest observed), with a z = 1.9 redshift.

9.6 Bya – In the Milky Way the star formation rate stabilizes.

9.24 Bya – Gliese 832 formed. It is a red dwarf of spectral type M2V star in the southern constellation Grus. Gliese 832 has two exoplanets in orbit.

9 Bya – Dark energy was starting to make its presence felt.

8.8 Bya – Milky Way’s thin disc starts to form. The Milky Way may have collided with a smaller satellite galaxy, causing the stars in the thin disk to be shaken up and creating the thick disc, while the gas would have settled into the galactic plane and reformed the thin disc.

8.5 Bya – Lalande 21185 formed. It is a star in the constellation of Ursa Major in the Milky Way galaxy. It is brightest red dwarf observable in the northern hemisphere. It has at least one planet in orbit, Lalande 21185 b.

Between 7.1 and 8.5 Bya – Arcturus forms. Arcturus is a red giant star in the Northern Hemisphere of Earth’s sky that is the brightest star in the constellation Boötes (the Herdsman). Arcturus may be a Population II star and a member of the Milky Way galaxy’s thick disc.

8.4 Bya – Lacaille 9352 formed. It is a red dwarf star in the southern constellation of Piscis Austrinus within the Milky Way galaxy.

8 Bya – Kapteyn c formed. It is an exoplanet orbiting the nearby Red dwarf star Kapteyn’s Star.

8 Bya – The Milky Way star formation rate begins to decline.

8 Bya – NML Cygni (V1489) forms. It is a red hypergiant or red supergiant in the constellation Cygnus. It is one of the largest stars currently known and is also one of the most luminous and massive cool hypergiants in the Milky Way.

7.8 Bya – Mizar forms. Mizar and Alcor are two stars forming a naked eye double in the handle of the Big Dipper (or Plough) asterism in the constellation of Ursa Major. Mizar is the second star from the end of the Big Dipper’s handle, and Alcor its fainter companion.

About 7.5 Bya – Dark energy begins dominating Universe. After being slowed for billion of years by gravity abundant dark matter takes hold and the cosmic expansion begins to speed up. Objects in the universe began flying apart at a faster rate.

7.5 Bya – GRB 080319B occurred and was the most powerful gamma ray burst ever observed by humans.

7.1 Bya – The Universe cools below 5 K, (K = Kelvin degrees).

6.4 Bya – Alnitak forms. Alnitak (Zeta Orionis) is a blue supergiant star in the Orion constellation. It is part of a three star system along with Alnilam and Mintaka. Alnitak is the brightest O-type star in the entire night sky and forms part of the Hunter’s Belt.

6.1 Bya – 61 Cygni forms. It is a binary star system in the constellation Cygnus of the Milky Way. 61 Cygni consists of a pair of K-type dwarf stars that orbit each other in a period of about 659 years.

6 Bya – Epsilon Indi star system formed. It is approximately 12 light years from Earth in the constellation of Indus. It consisting of a K-type main-sequence ε Indi A and two brown dwarfs, ε Indi Ba and ε Indi Bb, in a wide orbit around it. ε Indi A has one known planet in orbit.

5.8 Bya – Tau Ceti forms. It is a single star in the constellation Cetus that is spectrally similar to the Sun, although it has only about 78% of the Sun’s mass. Tau Ceti is the closest solitary G-class star to Earth.

5.6 Bya – EZ Aquarii (Luyten 789-6 and Gliese 866) formed. It is a triple star system approximately 11.3 light years from the Sun in the constellation Aquarius of the Milky Way. Its three components are all M-type red dwarfs stars.

The neighbourhood is beginning to take shape.

Location… Location… Location…

5.5 Bya – Milky Way becomes a spiral galaxy.

The Milky Way Galaxy, (which is home to us), started to form not long after the Big Bang, perhaps 13.5 billion years ago. It is now a typical barred spiral galaxy with a diameter between 150,000 and 200,000 light years. It is estimated to contain 100 to 400 billion stars and more than 100 billion planets. The Milky Way has several satellite galaxies and is part of the Local Group of galaxies, which forms part of the Virgo Supercluster, which is itself, a component of the Laniakea Supercluster.

5.3 Bya – Alpha Centauri forms. Alpha Centauri is the star system closest to the Solar System, being 4.37 light years from the Sun. It consists of three stars. Alpha Centauri A (Rigil Kentaurus) and Alpha Centauri B (Toliman) form the binary star Alpha Centauri AB and a small and faint red dwarf, Alpha Centauri C (Proxima Centauri) completes the star system.

5.2 Bya – Gilese 570 (33 G. Librae) forms. Gilese 570 is a ternary star system, which is approximately 19 light years away. The primary star is an orange dwarf star. The other secondary stars are themselves a binary system, consisting of two red dwarfs that orbit the primary star. A brown dwarf has been confirmed to be orbiting in the system.

5 Bya – YZ Ceti formed. It is a red dwarf star in the constellation Cetus and is just 12 light years away. YZ Ceti has three exoplanets in orbit.

4.799 Bya – Our solar system was born. A massive nebula in the middle rim of the Milky Way Galaxy begins to collapse and form dozens of proto-stars. A ball of gas which was to become our proto-sun continues to collapse under it’s own gravity. It grew ever hotter, all the while slowly drifting away from its sister suns and the great nebula of its birth.

4.77 Bya – Abell 370 started to form. It is a galaxy cluster located approximately 4 billion light years away from the Earth, in the constellation Cetus. Its core is made up of several hundred galaxies.

4.7 Bya – SN 2005ap supernova occurred. It was the second brightest supernova ever observed. SN 2005ap was an extremely energetic type Ic supernova in the galaxy SDSS J130115.12+274327.5.

4.603 Bya – The Sun formed. The Sun started to form from the collapse of part of a giant molecular cloud that consisted mostly of hydrogen and helium, which probably gave birth to many other stars. A vast disc of debris, dust and gas begins to form around the Sun and begins to coalesce into balls of rock and dust. Violent collisions occurred. Protoplanets, asteroids and comets start to form in the Sun’s protoplanetary disc.

The Sun is a G-type main-sequence (Population I) star. It is a nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, with internal convective motion that generates a magnetic field via a dynamo process. The Sun is by far the most important source of energy for life on Earth. In about 5 billion years time the Sun will exit the main sequence and become a red giant star. And several billion years later it will become a white dwarf star.

The Sun lies close to the inner rim of the Milky Way’s Orion Arm, in the Local Interstellar Cloud or the Gould Belt at a distance of 25,000 to 28,000 light years from the Galactic Centre. The Sun is contained within the Local Bubble, (a space of rarefied hot gas), which was possibly produced by the supernova remnant Geminga or multiple supernovae in subgroup B1 of the Pleiades moving group.

The distance between the local arm of our galaxy, (Milky Way) and the next arm out, the Perseus Arm, is about 6,500 light years. The Sun and the Solar System, is found in what scientists call the galactic habitable zone. It takes the Solar System about 225 to 250 million years, (a galactic year), to complete one orbit through the Milky Way.

The Sun has eight known planets. This includes four terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars), two gas giants (Jupiter and Saturn), and two ice giants (Uranus and Neptune). The Solar System also has at least five dwarf planets, an asteroid belt, numerous comets, and a large number of icy bodies, which lie beyond the orbit of Neptune.

Finding The Right Abode

4.6 Bya – Mars formed. It is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System after Mercury. Mars has 2 known moons and its orbital period is 686.971 (Earth) days. Mars lost its magnetosphere 4 billion years ago.

4.6 Bya – Venus formed. Venus is the second planet from the Sun, orbiting it every 224.7 Earth days. It has the longest rotation period, (243 days), of any planet in the Solar System and rotates in the opposite direction to most other planets, (meaning the Sun would rise in the west and set in the east). Venus does not have any natural satellites.

4.57 Bya – Proxima Centauri forms. Proxima Centauri, or Alpha Centauri C, is a red dwarf, a small low-mass star, about 4.244 light years from the Sun in the constellation of Centaurus.

4.56 Bya – Proto-planets such as Gaia (Geb or Keb) and Theia formed in the Sun’s protoplanetary disc.

4.543 Bya – The planet Theia impacts Gaia (Geb or Keb). Theia hits Gaia with a glancing blow. Gaia was shattered and the combined debris reforms Gaia into Earth. Also the coalesced debris, (mainly from Theia), forms into the Moon. Theia was a Mars sized planetoid with a mass 10% of that of Earth’s.

4.54 Bya – Earth formed. Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbour life. Its gravity interacts with other objects in space, especially the Sun and the Moon.

4.53 Bya – The Moon, Earth’s only natural satellite formed. It is the fifth largest natural satellite in the Solar System.

4.503 Bya – Mercury formed. Mercury is the smallest and first planet from the Sun. Its orbital period around the Sun of 87.97 days is the shortest of all the planets in the Solar System. Mercury was heavily bombarded by comets and asteroids during and shortly after its formation.

4.503 Bya – Jupiter formed. It is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System and has 27 known moons. It is a giant planet with a mass one thousandth that of the Sun, but two-and-a-half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined. Jupiter has an orbital period of 12 years.

4.503 Bya – Saturn formed. It is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest in the Solar System after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius about nine times that of Earth. Saturn has only one-eighth the average density of Earth, but with its larger volume Saturn is over 95 times more massive. It has an orbital period of 29 years.

4.503 Bya – Uranus formed. It is the seventh planet from the Sun and has 27 known moons. It has the third largest planetary radius and fourth largest planetary mass in the Solar System. Uranus is similar in composition to Neptune, and both have bulk chemical compositions. It has an orbital period of 84 years.

4.503 Bya – Neptune formed. It is the eighth and farthest known planet from the Sun and has 13 known moons. In the Solar System, it is the fourth-largest planet by diameter, the third most massive planet, and the densest giant planet. Neptune has an orbital period of 164.8 years.

4.25 Bya – Mintaka (Delta Orionis or 34 Orionis) forms. It is a multiple star system some 1,200 light years from the Sun in the constellation of Orion. Together with Alnitak and Alnilam, the three stars form Orion’s Belt.

3 to 4 Bya – Wolf 1061 (HIP 80824 or V2306 Ophiuchi) formed. It is an M class red dwarf star located about 13.8 light years away in the constellation Ophiuchus. Wolf 1061 has 3 exoplanets in orbit.

3.819 Bya – ASASSN-15lh (supernova designation SN 2015L) occurred. It was an extremely bright astronomical transient. It was the brightest supernova ever observed.

3.13 Bya – Van Maanen 2 formed. It is now a white dwarf star that is a dense, compact stellar remnant that is no longer generating energy.

3.02 Bya – Groombridge 34 formed. It is a binary star system in the northern constellation of Andromeda. Groombridge 34 comprises of two main sequence red dwarf stars GX Andromedae and GQ Andromedae and two planets Ab and Ac.

Between 100 Mya and 3 Bya – Luhman 16 (WISE 1049−5319 or WISE J104915.57−531906.1) formed. It is a binary brown-dwarf system in the southern constellation Vela at a distance of approximately 6.5 light years from the Sun. Its components are called Luhman 16A and Luhman 16B.

1 Bya – Ross 248 (HH Andromedae or Gliese 905) formed. It is a main sequence, red dwarf star located approximately 10.3 light years from Earth in the northern constellation of Andromeda.

1 Bya – Beta Ceti (Diphda or Deneb Kaitos) formed. It is the brightest star in the constellation of Cetus. Although designated ‘beta’, it is actually brighter than the ‘alpha’ star in the constellation. It is 96.3 light years from the Sun.

Unknown Bya – Luyten 726-8 (Gliese 65 or UV Ceti) formed. It is a binary red dwarf star system in the constellation Cetus that is one of Earth’s nearest neighbours at about 8.7 light years away. They orbit one another every 26.5 years.

400 to 800 Mya – Epsilon Eridani (Ran) formed. It is a star in the southern constellation of Eridanus 10.5 light years away. Epsilon Eridani has a giant exoplanet (AEgir) and two belts of rocky asteroids in orbit.

100 to 350 Mya – Wolf 359 formed. It is a red dwarf star located in the constellation Leo, near the ecliptic, at a distance of approximately 7.9 light years from Earth.

4 Mya – Lacaille 8760 formed. It is a red dwarf star in the constellation Microscopium and is 12.9 light years away.

3.47 Mya – Kruger 60 (HD 239960, HIP 110893, BD+56 2783 or Gliese 860A) formed. It is a binary star system within the Milky Way and is located 13.15 light years from the Sun. These red dwarf stars orbit each other every 44.6 years.

1 Mya – Gliese 1 formed. It is a red dwarf in the constellation Sculptor in the southern celestial hemisphere and is 14.2 light years away.

What A Buy!

It is exhilarating when you find what you want, especially when its real estate. It’s even better when you feel that it is a God given gift.

It just took 9.259 billion years for our Earth abode to come about and there it was 4.54 billion years ago. It was worth the wait for a place of such huge potential. A true renovators delight! Slightly battered and tilted, but it came with a moon. What more could you ask for!

But one has to put their mark on their home, usually a few changes are made.

However, if you have a renovators delight type abode, some serious work may be involved. And planet Earth will have to be knocked into shape.

Are you happy with your neighbourhood? Your abode?

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Let There Be Light

Robert Pollikett January 10, 2019

In The Beginning

There has to be a beginning, a catalyst that will enlighten us about our universe.
Was it God? Was it just the random fusion of gaseous matter! Or both.

Maybe we have reality wrong and we are just a reflection of a higher existence. Could an entity from another dimension of existence create or manifest stars and planets at will and place them wherever it desired in a lower dimension.

Unfortunately inter-dimensional interaction is beyond our understanding at this point in time. All we have available to us today, whether right or wrong, is the thoughts and conjecture of man. One can only work with the information and data at hand.

Well! Let there be light. The first stars were thought to be the Population III stars, followed by the Population II stars. Maybe the existing dust and gases of the early universe triggered by gravitational forces and the supernovas of the Population stars formed into Nebula. Did this Nebula in turn help create the stars of our now known universe? You be the judge…

Population III Stars – are a hypothetical population of extremely massive and hot stars with virtually no metals, except possibly for intermixing ejecta from other nearby Population III supernovas. It is thought that they were composed entirely of the primordial gas such as hydrogen, helium and very small amounts of lithium and beryllium. They think that they are observable in the quasar emission spectra and are also thought to be components of faint blue galaxies. But their existence is inferred from physical cosmology, they have not yet been observed directly.

Population II Stars – were presumably created from interstellar gas clouds that emerged shortly after the big bang. They would be relatively rich in hydrogen and helium but poor in elements heavier than helium, containing 10 to 100 times less of these elements than Population I stars. Population II stars are apparently found in globular clusters and in the halo of both spiral and elliptical galaxies. Some are found in the bulge of galaxies. Those found in the galactic halo would be older and thus more metal poor.

Nebula

A nebula is a giant cloud of dust and gas in space. Some nebulae, (more than one nebula), come from the gas and dust thrown out by the explosion of a dying star, such as a supernova. Other nebulae are regions where new stars are beginning to form. For this reason, some nebulae are called “star nurseries.”

Nebulae gases consist of mostly hydrogen and helium. The dust and gases in a nebula are very spread out, but it is thought that gravity can slowly begin to pull together these clumps of dust and gas. As these clumps get bigger and bigger, their gravity gets stronger and stronger! Eventually, the clump of dust and gas gets so big that it collapses from its own gravity. The collapse causes the material at the centre of the cloud to heat up. This hot core can be the beginning of a star.

The nebulae that exist in the space between the stars, is also known as interstellar space. The closest known nebula to Earth is called the Helix Nebula and is approximately 700 light-years away. It is the remnant of a dying star, possibly one like the Sun.

Dark nebula, (absorption nebula), is a type of interstellar cloud that is so dense that it obscures the light from objects behind it, such as background stars and emission or reflection nebulae. The extinction of the light is caused by interstellar dust grains located in the coldest, densest parts of larger molecular clouds. Clusters and large complexes of dark nebulae are associated with Giant Molecular Clouds. Isolated small dark nebulae are called Bok globules.

Most nebulae can be described as diffuse nebulae, which means, that they are extended and contain no well-defined boundaries. Diffuse nebulae can be divided into emission nebula (The Omega Nebula), reflection nebula (Herbig–Haro object HH 161 and HH 164) and dark nebula (Horsehead Nebula).

Star Classification

Morgan–Keenan (MK) – is a star classification system that uses the letters O, B, A, F, G, K, and M. The stars are easily classified from the hottest (O) to the coolest, (M). While the simple addition of a number from 0 to 9 is used to further subdivide a star into a spectral class to form a sequence from hot to cool, e.g. A8, A9, F0, F1.

White stars – are not always singular stars. The majority of perceived white stars are actually part of either a binary, triplet or multiple star system. Binary stars are two stars in close proximity, which orbit around their common centre of mass. A star system or stellar system is a small number of stars, (three or more), that orbit each other, bound by gravitational attraction.

A large number of stars bound by gravitation are generally called a star cluster or galaxy. “White Star” is a term given to main-sequence stars that are extremely bright to the eye. They can have masses from 1.4 to 2.1 times the mass of the Sun and surface temperatures between 7,500K and 10,000K. (K = Kelvin).

Examples of apparent White Stars are as follows:
Arcturus – a red giant star in the Northern Hemisphere of Earth’s sky that is the brightest star in the constellation Boötes (the Herdsman). It is the fourth brightest in the night sky and the brightest in the northern celestial hemisphere.

Vega (α Lyrae) – the brightest star in the constellation of Lyra. It is the fifth brightest star in the night sky and the second brightest star in the northern celestial hemisphere after Arcturus. It is relatively close at only 25 light-years from the Sun and together with Arcturus and Sirius is one of the most luminous stars in the Sun’s neighbourhood.

Based on an observed excess emission of infrared radiation, Vega appears to have a circumstellar disc of dust. This dust is likely to be the result of collisions between objects in an orbiting debris disk, which is analogous to the Kuiper belt in the Solar System. Stars that display infrared excess due to dust emission are termed Vega-like stars.

Procyon – a binary star system in Canis Minor (the lesser dog), which is a constellation in the Northern Hemisphere. It is among the 10 brightest stars from Earth’s sky. The system is made up of Procyon A, (a main sequence star), and Procyon B, (a much smaller white dwarf).

Canis Major (Greater Dog) – is a constellation. This binary system consists of a main-sequence star of spectral type A0 or A1, termed Sirius A, (Dog Star), and a faint white dwarf companion of spectral type DA2, designated Sirius B. The distance between the two varies between 8.2 and 31.5 astronomical units as they orbit every 50 years.

Alpha Centauri – the closest star system to the Solar System at 4.37 light-years from the Sun. It is a triple star system, consisting of three stars: α Centauri A, α Centauri B, and α Centauri C. Alpha Centauri A and B are Sun-like stars, and together they form the binary star Alpha Centauri AB. Alpha Centauri C (Proxima Centauri) is a small and faint red dwarf, (Class M). Though not visible to the naked eye it is the closest star to our Sun.

Nu Scorpii – a multiple star system in the constellation of Scorpius. It is most likely a septuple star system consisting of two close groups that are separated by 41 arcseconds. Based on parallax measurements, it is approximately 470 light-years from the Sun. The component Nu Scorpii Aa is also named Jabbah.

Cygnus X-1 – a galactic X-ray source in the constellation Cygnus and is widely accepted to be a black hole. It was discovered in 1964 during a rocket flight and is one of the strongest X-ray sources seen from Earth, producing a peak X-ray flux density of 2.3×10⁻²³ Wm−2 Hz−1.

Typical Living Stars

Blue Stars – are of a spectral type O, B and have a typical age of <~40 million years. They are both characterized by the strong, Helium-II, absorption lines in their respective spectra’s. The hydrogen and neutral helium lines in O-type stars are marked weaker than in B-type stars.

Because blue stars are so hot and massive, they have relatively short lives that end in violent supernova events, ultimately resulting in the creation of either black holes or neutron stars. O-type stars have surface temperatures > 30,000 K and B-type stars have surface temperatures of 10,000 – 30,000 K. (K = Kelvin).

Blue stars are commonly found in active star forming regions, particularly in the arms of spiral galaxies, where their light illuminates surrounding dust and gas clouds making these areas typically appear blue.

They are also often found in complex multi-star systems, where their evolution is much more difficult to predict due to the phenomenon of mass transfer between stars, as well as the possibility of different stars in the system ending their lives as supernovas at different times. Examples of blue stars include 10 Lacertae, AE Aurigae, Delta Circini, V560 Carinae, Mu Columbae, Sigma Orionis, Theta1 Orionis C and Zeta Ophiuchi.

Yellow Dwarf Stars – are of a spectral type G and have a typical age of ~4 to ~17 billion years. G-type stars are often mistakenly referred to as yellow dwarf stars. Our Sun is a G-type star, but it is in fact white, since all the colours it emits are blended together. However, the Sun’s visible light is blended to produce white but its visible light emission peaks in the green part of the spectrum. The green component is absorbed and/or scattered by other frequencies both in the Sun itself and in Earth’s atmosphere.

All G-type stars convert hydrogen into helium in their cores, and will evolve into red giants as their supply of hydrogen fuel is depleted. G-type stars have surface temperatures of 5,000 – 6,000 K. Examples of yellow dwarf stars include Alpha Centauri A, Tau Ceti and 51 Pegasi.

Orange Dwarf Stars – are of a spectral type K and have a typical age of ~15 to ~30 billion years. They fall between red M-type and yellow G-type main-sequence stars. K-type stars are of particular interest in the search for extraterrestrial life, since they emit markedly less UV radiation, (that damages or destroys DNA), than G-type stars. K-type stars have surface temperatures of 3,700 – 5,200 K.

They also remain stable on the main sequence for up to about 30 billion years as compared to about 10 billion years for the Sun. K-type stars are also about four times as common as G-type stars, making the search for exoplanets a lot easier. Examples of orange dwarf stars include Alpha Centauri B and Epsilon Indi.

Red Dwarf Stars – are of a spectral type K, M and their typical age is undetermined, but they are expected to burn for several trillion years. They are small and relatively cool stars. However, they are bigger than brown dwarfs but are less than 40 – 50% of the mass of our Sun. They are also much dimmer than our Sun. K-type stars have surface temperatures of 3,700 – 5,200 K and M-type stars have surface temperatures of 2,400 – 3,700 K.

Red dwarfs account for the bulk of the Milky Ways’ stellar population. Typically, red dwarf stars that are more massive than 0.35 solar masses are fully convective, which means that the process of converting hydrogen into helium occurs throughout the star, and not only in the core, as is the case with more massive stars.

Hence, the nuclear fusion process is slowed down and at the same time greatly prolonged, which keeps the star at a constant luminosity and temperature for several trillion years. The process of nuclear synthesis happens so slowly in these stars that the Universe is not old enough for any known red dwarf star to have aged into an advanced state of evolution. Examples of red dwarf stars include Proxima Centauri and TRAPPIST-1.

Stars that are Giants and Supergiants

Supergiants are among the most massive and most luminous stars. Supergiant stars occupy the top region of the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram with absolute visual magnitudes between about −3 and −8. The temperature range of supergiant stars spans from about 3,450 K to over 20,000 K. (K = Kelvin).

Blue Giant Stars – are of a spectral type O, B and occasionally A and have a typical age of ~10 to ~100 million years. They are bright, giant stars that are between 10 and 100 times the size of the Sun and between 10 and 1,000 times its luminosity. O-type stars have surface temperatures >/ 30,000 K and B-type stars have surface temperatures of 10,000 – 30,000 K. A-type stars have surface temperatures of 7,500 – 10,000 K.

The term “blue giant star” has no scientific definition, and is commonly applied to a wide variety of stars that have all evolved off the main sequence. However, for practical reasons, stars with luminosity classifications of III and II, (bright giant and giant) respectively, are referred to as “blue giant stars” purely for convenience, but they have to be above 10,000K. Nonetheless, the term blue giant is often misapplied to some stars simply because they are big and hot.

In practice however, big stars are referred to as “blue giants” when they inhabit a specific region of the H-R diagram, rather than because the star meets a specific set of criteria. Examples of blue giant stars include Iota Orionis, LH54-425, Meissa, Plaskett’s star, Xi Persei and Mintaka.

Blue Supergiant Stars – are of a spectral type OB and have a typical age of ~10 million years. They are scientifically known as OB super giants, and generally have luminosity classifications of I, and spectral classifications of B9 or earlier. A Blue super giant star is typically larger than the Sun, but smaller then a red super giant stars. They fall into a mass range of between 10 and 100 solar masses. O-type stars have surface temperatures >/ 30,000 K and B-type stars have surface temperatures of 10,000 – 30,000 K.

These type-O and early type-B main sequence stars leave the main sequence in only a few million years because they burn through their supply of hydrogen very quickly due to their high masses. These stars start the process of expansion into the blue super giant phase as soon as heavy elements appear on their surfaces, but in some cases, some stars evolve directly into Wolf–Rayet stars, skipping the “normal” blue super giant phase. Because of their mass and hotness, they are relatively short-lived and quickly exhaust their hydrogen fuel, ending as red supergiants or neutron stars.

Examples of blue supergiant stars include UW Canis Majoris (UW CMa), a blue-white (O-type) supergiant; Rigel (ß Orionis), a blue-white (B-type) supergiant; Zeta Puppis (Naos), a blue (O-type) supergiant; 29 Canis Majoris; Alnitak; Alpha Camelopardalis; Cygnus X-1; Tau Canis Majoris and Zeta Puppis.

Wolf–Rayet Stars (WR stars) – are a rare heterogeneous set of stars with unusual spectra showing prominent broad emission lines of highly ionized helium and nitrogen or carbon. The spectra indicate very high surface enhancement of heavy elements, depletion of hydrogen and strong stellar winds.

Red Giant Stars – are of a spectral type M, K and have a typical age of ~0.1 – ~2 billion years. They are of low or intermediate mass, perhaps weighing in at between 0.3 to 10 solar masses. A Red Giant is a main-sequence star that has fused all its hydrogen into helium. K-type stars have surface temperatures of 3,700 – 5,200 K and M-type stars have surface temperatures of 2,400 – 3,700 K.

The Red-Giant branch (RGB) is the most common portion of the giant branch before helium ignition occurs in the course of stellar evolution. It then starts to burn its helium to produce carbon and oxygen, and expands to many times its previous volume to become a red giant.

The Horizontal branch (HB) is a stage of stellar evolution that immediately follows the red giant branch in stars whose masses are similar to the Sun’s. Horizontal-branch stars are powered by helium fusion in the core (via the triple-alpha process) and by hydrogen fusion (via the CNO cycle) in a shell surrounding the core.

The red clump giants are cool horizontal branch stars, (which were originally similar to the Sun), that have undergone a helium flash and are now fusing helium in their cores.

Asymptotic-giant-branch (AGB) is a period of stellar evolution that is undertaken by all low to intermediate mass stars (0.6–10 solar masses) late in their lives. The AGB phase is divided into two parts, the early AGB (E-AGB) and the thermally pulsing AGB (TP-AGB).

During the E-AGB phase, the main source of energy is helium fusion in a shell around a core consisting mostly of carbon and oxygen. During this phase, the star swells up to giant proportions to become a red giant again. After the helium shell runs out of fuel, the TP-AGB starts. Now the star derives its energy from fusion of hydrogen in a thin shell, which restricts the inner helium shell to a very thin layer and prevents it fusing stably.

When a red giant has used up its helium to produce carbon and oxygen and has insufficient mass to generate the core temperatures required to fuse carbon, it sheds its outer layers to form a planetary nebula, and leaves behind an inert mass of carbon and oxygen. After a relatively short time (in the region of two hundred million years), the red giant puffs out its outer layers in a gas cloud called a nebula and collapses in on itself to form a white dwarf. Examples of red giants include Aldebaran, Arcturus and Gacrux

Red Supergiant Stars – are of a spectral type K, M and have a typical age of ~3 million to ~100 million years. They have a supergiant luminosity class of Yerkes I. They are the largest stars in the universe in terms of volume, although they are not the most massive or luminous. K-type stars have surface temperatures of 3,700 – 5,200 K and M-type stars have surface temperatures of 2,400 – 3,700 K.

Red supergiants have exhausted their supply of hydrogen at their cores and as a result, their outer layers expand hugely as they evolve off the main sequence. In rare cases, red supergiant stars are massive enough to fuse very heavy elements, (including iron), that are arranged around the core in a way that somewhat resembles the layers of an onion, only without sharp divisions.

Red supergiants that create heavy elements eventually explode as type-II supernovas. Examples of red supergiants include Alpha Herculis (Rasalgethi), Psi1 Aurigae, 119 Tauri, Antares, Betelgeuse, Mu Cephei and VV Cephei A.

Brown Dwarf Stars – are of a spectral type M, L, T and Y and their typical age is undetermined, but they are expected to be greater than 100 million years old. They are commonly referred to as “failed stars”. Brown dwarfs are sub-stellar objects that fill the gap between the most massive gas planets, and the least massive true stars.

M-type stars have surface temperatures of 2,400 – 3,700 K. With L-T-Y types no distinct temperature or luminosity values can be given. However, they are estimated as being… L-type stars surface temperatures of 1,300 – 2,400 K, T-type stars surface temperatures of 500 – 1,300 K and Y-type stars surface temperatures of 250 – 500 K.

Brown dwarfs have masses between approximately 13 to 75-80 times that of Jupiter (MJ) or approximately 2.5×1028 kg to about 1.5×1029 kg. Below this range are the sub-brown dwarfs, (sometimes referred to as rogue planets), and above it are the lightest red dwarfs (M9 V). Brown dwarfs may be fully convective, with no layers or chemical differentiation by depth.

Brown dwarfs are not massive enough to sustain nuclear fusion of ordinary hydrogen (1H) to helium in their cores. They are, however, thought to fuse deuterium (2H) and to fuse lithium (7Li) if their mass is above a debated threshold of 13 MJ and 65 MJ, respectively. It is also debated whether brown dwarfs would be better defined by their formation processes rather than by their supposed nuclear fusion reactions.

Although they may glow dimly when newly formed they soon start to cool and become very difficult to spot. Brown dwarfs are not very luminous at visible wavelengths and are actually of different colours. Many brown dwarfs would likely appear magenta to the human eye or possibly orange to red. They may actually be among the most common type of stars.

Planets are known to orbit brown dwarfs, such as: 2M1207b, MOA-2007-BLG-192Lb, and 2MASS J044144b. Examples of brown dwarf stars include Gliese 229 B, 54 Piscium and Luhman 16. Although brown dwarf stars exist in large numbers, Luhman 16 is the closest known example, being only 6.5 light years away.

Dead Stars

White Dwarf Stars – are of a spectral type D and their typical age is undetermined, but estimated to be between ~100,000 years to ~10 billion years. They are stars, which have cores of low and intermediate mass (typically lower than 3 solar masses) and have blown off their outer layers late in their lives. White dwarf stars are small, dense, burnt-out husks of stars that no longer undergo fusion reactions and they represent the final evolutionary state of most of the stars in our galaxy.

These stellar remnants no longer produce energy to counteract their mass, and are supported against gravitational collapse by a process called electron degeneracy pressure. While the theoretical maximum mass of a white dwarf star cannot exceed 1.4 solar masses, (Chandrasekhar limit), this value does not include the effects of rotation. In practice, this means that rapidly spinning white dwarf stars can exceed the maximum mass limit by a significant margin. The effective surface temperatures of a White dwarf, extends from over 150,000 K to barely under 4,000 K depending upon its energy levels. (K = Kelvin).

A white dwarf is also called a degenerate dwarf. It is a stellar core remnant composed mostly of electron-degenerate matter. A white dwarf is very dense; their mass is comparable to that of the Sun, while its volume is comparable to that of Earth. Near the end of its nuclear burning stage, this type of star expels most of its outer material, creating a planetary nebula. Only the hot core of the star remains.

Some types of white dwarfs, most notably carbon-oxygen stars, can also survive several nuclear explosions on their surfaces when the mass of accreted material pulled from normal companion stars exceed a critical level. Examples of white dwarfs include Sirius B, Procyon B, Van Maanen 2, 40 Eridani B and Stein 2051 B.

Black Dwarf Stars – are hypothetical stellar remnants that are theorized to be created when white dwarf stars have radiated away all of their leftover heat and light. However, it can take up till 10 billion years for this to happen. Which means that there is very little time for black dwarfs to have formed because the Universe is only 13.779 billion years old.

If these theoretical stars could one day exist, none of them would be found within the remaining lifetime of our Sun. They would also be incredibly difficult to detect due to a lack of radiation. Although they would still retain mass and with their gravitational influence would provide a clue to their origins in space.

Neutron Stars – are of a spectral type D and their typical age is undetermined, but estimated to be between ~100,000 years to ~10 billion years. The temperature inside a newly formed neutron star is from around 10¹¹ to 10¹² K (Kelvin). However, the huge number of neutrinos it emits will carry away so much energy that the temperature of an isolated neutron star falls within a few years to around 106 K (Kelvin).

They are the collapsed cores of massive stars, (between 10 and 29 solar masses), that were compressed past the white dwarf stage during a supernova event. In this state, the entire mass of the stellar remnant consists of neutrons, particles that are marginally more massive than protons, but carry no electrical charge. Neutron stars are supported against their own mass by a process called “neutron degeneracy pressure”. Smaller collapsed neutron stars will become white dwarfs.

But the process of gravitational collapse into a black hole may continue if the remnant has more than 3 solar masses. However, neutron stars with very high spin rates may be able to resist collapsing into black holes even if they have substantially more than 3 solar masses. Larger neutron stars, over about 5 solar masses, will collapse completely into a black hole singularity.

After a supernova explosion some neutron stars will emit regular pulses of radiation and are known as pulsars.

Examples of neutron stars include PSR J0108-1431 (closest neutron star); LGM-1 (the first recognized radio-pulsar); PSR B1257+12 ( the first neutron star discovered with planets); SWIFT J1756.9-2508 (a millisecond pulsar with a stellar-type companion with planetary range mass); PSR B1509−58 (source of the “Hand of God” is a pulsar approximately 17,000 light-years away in the constellation of Circinus) and PSR J0348+0432 (the most massive neutron star with a well-constrained mass of 2.01 ± 0.04 solar masses).

Pulsars – are often referred to as a class of star, but pulsars are merely energetic neutron stars that emit huge quantities of radiation in various frequencies.

Variable Stars – are stars that grow and shrink in size periodically and appear to pulsate. The changes in apparent brightness may be due to variations in the star’s actual luminosity or to variations in the amount of the star’s light that is blocked from reaching Earth.

Black Holes – while smaller stars may become a neutron star or a white dwarf after their fuel begins to run out, larger stars with masses more than three times that of our sun may end their lives in a supernova explosion. The dead remnant left behind with no outward pressure to oppose the force of gravity will then continue to collapse into a gravitational singularity and eventually become a black hole. The gravity of such an object would be so strong that not even light can escape from it.

However, there are a variety of different black holes. Stellar mass black holes are the result of a star around 10 times heavier than the Sun ending its life in a supernova explosion. Super massive black holes found at the centre of galaxies may be millions or even billions of times more massive than the Sun. Examples of black holes include Cygnus X-1, and Sagittarius A.

Star Disc

Star Disc’s are formations around stars and are circumstellar, protoplanetary and proplyd in form.

Circumstellar Disc (circumstellar disk) – is a torus, pancake or ring-shaped accumulation of matter composed of gas, dust, planetesimals, asteroids or collision fragments in orbit around a star. Around the youngest stars, they are the reservoirs of material out of which planets may form.

Protoplanetary Disc – is a rotating circumstellar disc of dense gas and dust surrounding a young newly formed star such as a T Tauri star or Herbig Ae/Be star.

T Tauri stars (TTS) – are a class of variable stars associated with youth. They are less than about ten million years old. This class is named after the prototype, T Tauri, a young star in the Taurus star-forming region.

A Herbig Ae/Be (HAeBe) star – is a pre-main-sequence star. It is a young star of spectral types A or B. These stars are still embedded in gas-dust envelopes and are sometimes accompanied by circumstellar discs. Hydrogen and calcium emission lines are observed in their spectra.

Proplyd (ionized protoplanetary disc) – is an externally illuminated photo-evaporating disc around a young star. Nearly 180 proplyd’s have been discovered in the Orion Nebula.

Star Clusters

Globular Cluster (Globular) – is a spherical collection of stars that orbits a galactic core as a satellite. They are very tightly bound by gravity, which gives them their spherical shapes and relatively high stellar densities toward their centres.

Globular clusters are found in the halo of a galaxy. They are less dense then open clusters and contain considerably more stars, which are much older. Although it appears that globular clusters contain some of the first stars to be produced in the galaxy, their origins and their role in galactic evolution are still unclear. It does appear that globular clusters are significantly different from dwarf elliptical galaxies and were formed as part of the star formation of the parent galaxy rather than as a separate galaxy.

Globular clusters are fairly common. There are about 150 to 158 currently known globular clusters in the Milky Way, with more to be discovered. Larger galaxies can have more stars. The Andromeda Galaxy may have 500 globular clusters. Some giant elliptical galaxies, (particularly those at the centres of galaxy clusters), such as M87, have as many as 13,000 globular clusters. The Messier 80 globular cluster in the constellation Scorpius is located about 30,000 light-years from the Sun and contains hundreds of thousands of stars.

Every galaxy of sufficient mass in the Local Group has an associated group of globular clusters. And almost every large galaxy surveyed has been found to possess a system of globular clusters. The Sagittarius Dwarf galaxy and the disputed Canis Major Dwarf galaxy appears to be in the process of donating their associated globular clusters, (such as Palomar 12), to the Milky Way. How many more globular clusters might have been acquired in the past?

Open Cluster – they are stars found in the disc of a galaxy. They form a group of up to a few thousand stars, which were formed from the same giant molecular cloud and would be roughly the same age. They are loosely gravitationally bound to each other, in contrast to globular clusters, which are very tightly bound by gravity. More than 1,100 open clusters have been discovered within the Milky Way Galaxy and many more are thought to exist.

Stellar Stream – is an association of stars orbiting a galaxy that was once a globular cluster or dwarf galaxy that has now been torn apart and stretched out along its orbit by tidal forces.

Magellanic Stream – contains a gaseous feature dubbed the leading arm. It is a stream of high-velocity clouds of gas extending from the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds over 100 degrees through the Galactic south pole of the Milky Way.

Virgo Stellar Stream (Virgo Overdensity) – is the proposed name for a stellar stream in the constellation of Virgo, which was discovered in 2005. The stream is thought to be the remains of a dwarf spheroidal galaxy that is in the process of merging with the Milky Way.

Galaxies

Galaxies can exist in clusters and Superclusters.
A galaxy is gravitationally bound system consisting of a huge collection of interstellar gas, dust, stellar remnants, billions of stars and their solar systems and dark matter. Our galaxy, (the Milky Way), also has a super massive black hole in the middle.

Galaxy Cluster (cluster of galaxies) – is a structure that consists of anywhere from hundreds to thousands of galaxies that are bound together by gravity with typical masses ranging from 10¹⁴ – 10¹⁵ solar masses.

Supercluster – is a large group of smaller galaxy clusters or galaxy groups. They are among the largest-known structures of the cosmos. The Milky Way is part of the Local Group galaxy group, which contains more than 54 galaxies, which in turn is part of the Laniakea Supercluster.

Galaxies are divided into four main groups, ie: spiral, barred spiral, elliptical, and irregular. Galaxies can either form into a polar-ring galaxy or contain a quasar.

Spiral Galaxy – has a distinct winding shape. Most of the galaxies observed by astronomers are spiral galaxies. The arms of a spiral galaxy have lots of gas and dust, and they are often areas where new stars are constantly forming. The bulge of a spiral galaxy is a central concentration of stars composed primarily of old, red stars. Very little star formation goes on in the bulge.

Barred Spiral Galaxy – is a spiral galaxy with a central bar-shaped structure composed of many stars. Bars are found in between one third and two thirds of all spiral galaxies. Galactic bars develop when stellar orbits in a spiral galaxy become unstable and deviate from a circular path. The tiny elongations in the stars’ orbits grow and get locked into place, forming a bar. The bar becomes even more pronounced as it collects more and more stars in elliptical orbits.

Galactic bars generally affect both the motions of stars and interstellar gas within spiral galaxies and can affect spiral arms as well. The Milky Way Galaxy is a typical barred spiral galaxy, much like billions of other galaxies in the universe. The Andromeda Galaxy (within the Milky Way) is also a barred spiral galaxy.

Elliptical Galaxy – These types of galaxies are the most abundant type of galaxies found in the universe. However, because of their age and dim qualities, they are frequently outshone by younger, brighter collection of stars. Elliptical galaxies lack the swirling arms of the spiral galaxies.

Irregular Galaxy – is a galaxy that does not have a distinct regular shape, such as a spiral or an elliptical galaxy. Irregular galaxies do not fall into any of the regular classes of the Hubble sequence. They are often chaotic in appearance with neither a nuclear bulge nor any trace of spiral arm structure.

Polar-ring Galaxy – is a type of galaxy in which an outer ring of gas and stars rotates over the poles of the galaxy. The ring contains many massive, relatively young blue stars, which are extremely bright. The central region contains relatively little luminous matter. These polar rings are thought to form when two galaxies gravitationally interact with each other.

Quasar (QSO or quasi-stellar object) – is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It has been theorized that most large galaxies contain a super massive central black hole with mass ranging from millions to billions of times the mass of our Sun.

In quasars and other types of AGN, the black hole is surrounded by a gaseous accretion disk. As gas falls toward the black hole, energy is released in the form of electromagnetic radiation, which can be observed across the electromagnetic spectrum. The power radiated by quasars is enormous. The most powerful quasars have luminosities thousands of times greater than a galaxy such as the Milky Way.

Star Constellations

A constellation is a group of stars that forms an imaginary outline or meaningful pattern on the celestial sphere, typically representing an animal, mythological person or creature, a god, or an inanimate object.

Origins for the earliest constellations likely go back to prehistory. Examples include the Pleiades and Hyades within the constellation Taurus and the False Cross split between the southern constellations Carina and Vela, or Venus’ Mirror in the constellation of Orion.

Enlightenment

How do you see the stars? What affect do they have on your life?
Do you view them as God given to help you with the boundary of time?
Or do you see them as just being the fusion of the random elements in space?

Could an entity from a higher realm of existence have simply seeded or planted our heavenly bodies?

What do you think?

33 comments

The Dark Side

Robert Pollikett December 14, 2018

Dark Matter and Dark Energy

Is there negative energy in space?
Does positive energy and negative energy balance each other out, ie: = zero?
Is there more mass in the universe than what is visible?

Scientists are postulating the existence of dark matter and dark energy in our universe due to observed irregularities in the make up of our universe. However, they do not know how or when dark matter and dark energy could have come into existence.

A quandary arose in the 1920’s when astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe is not static but expanding. In 1998 the Hubble Space Telescope was used to study very distant supernovas that occurred a long time ago. In doing so they realized that our universe was expanding more slowly than it is today. This was puzzling because it was thought that the gravity of matter in the universe would slow its expansion or even cause it to contract. Was there something not seen on the dark side?

In the 1960’s and 1970’s, astronomers began to think that there might be more mass in the universe than what is visible. During this time period astronomer Vera Rubinat observed the speeds of stars at various locations in galaxies. She found that all the stars in a galaxy seemed to circle the centre at more or less the same speed, which went against Newton’s Laws of Physics. Was the dark side influencing our universe?

The mysterious and invisible mass became known as dark matter due to the gravitational pull it exerts on regular matter. It is thought that this dark matter could be formed by exotic particles that don’t interact with light or regular matter, hence making it difficult to detect. Dark energy is thought to be the strange force that is pulling the cosmos apart at ever increasing speeds. But this dark energy remains undetected and shrouded in mystery.

Our early universe was smaller and denser than it is today. However a pattern of imperfections was observed due to the leftover glow of the cosmic microwave background. This pattern of imperfections required our universe to be made of about 27% dark matter, in comparison to only about 5% normal matter.

The Dark Age of our early universe came to an end at about 1 billion years after the Big Bang (12.799 Bya) with the end of the Reionization era. It is also thought that about 9 billion years ago the dark energy density was low enough that its effects on the Universe’s expansion rate were not noticeable. And that about 6 billion years ago the matter and dark energy densities were equal.

Today it is debated that the dark matter makes up 23 percent of the universe, whilst in comparison only 4 percent of the universe is composed of regular matter, which encompasses stars, planets and people. The strange pulling force of the cosmos known as Dark energy is thought to make up 73 percent of the universe.

Dark Matter and Dark Energy is one of the most hotly debated topics in cosmology today. It still not known what they really are or when they came into existence!

Our Dark Side

Do you have a dark side?
How do you feel about the dark side?
Do you think it to be either menacing or even sinister?

Ever since I can remember as a child the baddies were dressed in black and the goodies were dressed in white. Bad and/or evil things were in the dark and good things were in the light. The light always seemed to be the demise of bad things.

Our perception of good and bad seems to stem from the knowledge of a heavenly war when Lucifer challenged the position of God Head. About one third of the spiritual entities rebelled. Their fate was sealed when they were cast into the abyss and covered in darkness within the earthly realm. The “Watchers” whose tasks it was to spiritually help mankind, lusted over the women of Cain and those of Seth who erred in their ways. The angelic Watchers broke the spiritual code of conduct, manifested themselves and took the women as wives.

The result of the Watchers fornication was the corruption of mankind both spiritually and physically within their DNA. The women gave birth to the Nephilim (Giants), such as the Rephiam, Emim and Anakim. The flood of Noah was done to eradicate the Nephilim and carnal man from their known world. However, the spirits of these giants were to become earth bound demons. The demonic spirits were invoked when Ham and his son Cush fled from Noah and brought back the ways of before the flood.

Ham carried on in the knowledge of divination. Cush sought dominion and authority over people; he also sought to become a deity and promoted immorality. Nimrod originally walked in the way of God, but pride later snared him in the way of his father Cush. Nimrod revived the art of astronomy. Through Nimrod the satanic and pagan practices eventuated. The origins of the gods of old, paganism, mysticism, the occult and false church teachings seem to stem from the ways of Nimrod.

Nimrod was the origin of sun god worship. The sun gods were always depicted with rays of light around or above their heads. Nimrod married his mother Semiramus and had a son Tammuz. From Semiramus and Tammuz the false teachings of mother and son entered the Christian churches along with Christmas and Easter.

Semiramus was the origin of the Queen of Heaven, the goddess of love and fertility. She was offered raisin buns, as part of her worship, and over time she became the forerunner of Easter traditions. The birth of Tammuz was during the winter solstice of the northern hemisphere and over time became recognised as December 25th.

The problem today is that many people think that they are on the side of good but are unknowingly walking in the dark side. Many people are confused by biblical teachings because they find similar teachings that are written through a pagan perspective. The pagans either had no understanding of God and/or denounced Him.

Nimrod was known to challenge the way of God for he was a rebel who twisted the truth to suite himself. Paganism stems from Nimrod and the teachers and historians of old were either of Persian, Greek or Roman pagan ancestry.

Life today is a challenge. The truth is twisted and lies abound. Bad vibrations are all around and many walk in the dark side. If you are a seeker of biblical truth you must turn away from the misguided church and read the bible for yourself.

The truth is in the bible and other associated books such as the books of Enoch, Jubilees and Jasher. When reading the bible review the Old Testament for the New Testament is based on the knowledge contained in it. The books of Enoch, Jubilees and Jasher will give you more insight.

It is up to you to come out of the dark and enlighten yourself.
May you find the light and live a good life whilst waiting for your salvation.

29 comments

Eon of Darkness

Robert Pollikett December 3, 2018

Darkness

How do you feel about the dark?
Do you perceive darkness to be a time of doom and gloom or a time to rest?

Some people associate darkness with evil, wickedness, corruption, sin, sinfulness, iniquity, immorality, devilry, etc. Others associate darkness to unhappiness or even secrecy. Or do you see it as a time of self-reflection and/or rest.

How you perceive darkness depends upon your religious beliefs, knowledge and life experiences. We all have dark periods in our life, but as they say: “Every dark cloud has a silver lining” and/or “See the light at the end of the tunnel”. Mankind as a rule seeks the light and enlightenment for it gives us hope and encouragement.

Through our periods of darkness we can learn from our mistakes, we can prepare ourselves to lead a better life and perhaps be a glowing example to others. But no one in their right mind would consider suffering an eon of darkness, however our universe did just that.

How The Dark Age Began

About 47,000 years after the Big Bang, [13.798953 Billion years ago (Bya)], the early universe started to decelerate at a faster rate. This brought on the beginning of the gravitational collapse of the early universe, about 70,000 years after the Big Bang, (13.79893 Bya). The early universe still consisted of 75% hydrogen and 25% helium and its distribution remained constant as the electron-baryon plasma continued to thin. The gravitational collapse was a very slow process.

It is thought that 377,000 years after the Big Bang, (13.798623 Bya), the temperature of the early universe fell to about 4,000 K (Kelvin). This brought on the era of Recombination that lasted for about 3 million years. About 380,000 years after the Big Bang, (13.79862 Bya), the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) created the Afterglow Light Pattern that is still detectable today.

About 400,000 years after the Big Bang, (13.7986 Bya), Density Waves began to imprint their characteristic polarization (wave) signals through out the early universe.

The decoupled photons of the Recombination era probably would have filled the universe with a brilliant pale orange glow at first and then gradually red shifted to non-visible wavelengths after about 3 million years leaving it without visible light. The end of the “Recombination” era brought on the Dark Age.

The Dark Age

Although it is thought that the Dark Age lasted up to about 1 billion years after the Big Bang, it began to change about 400 million years after the Big Bang. So! Somewhere between 3.377 million years after the Big Bang (13.795623 Bya) and 1 billion years after the Big Bang (12.799 Bya), the Dark Age took place.

However, the early universe was not meant to die, it struggled and kept changing.

About 10 million years after the Big Bang (13.789 Bya) traces of heavy elements began to develop. These are the heavy elements whose later chemical reactions would spark the beginning of life.

It is believed that between 10 to 17 million years after the Big Bang, (13.789 to 13.782 Bya), the temperature of cosmic background radiation cooled from some 4,000 K (Kelvin) down to about 60 K. The background temperature of the early universe was between 373 K and 273 K, this would have allowed the possibility of liquid water to form.

About 100 million years after the Big Bang (13.699 Bya) the Gravitational collapse of ordinary matter particles started to fall into structures created by dark matter. Quasars begin to take shape as the gaseous accretion forms disks around black holes. As the gas falls toward a black hole, energy is released in the form of electromagnetic radiation. Population III (Pop III) stars were starting to form. They were very hot and had a short lifetime. Their ultraviolet light started to ionize the remaining neutral hydrogen gas.

Population III Stars are a hypothetical population of extremely massive and hot stars with virtually no metals, except possibly for intermixing ejecta from other nearby Population III supernovas. It is thought that they were composed entirely of the primordial gas such as hydrogen, helium and very small amounts of lithium and beryllium. They have been observed in the quasar emission spectra and are also thought to be components of faint blue galaxies. But their existence is inferred from physical cosmology, they have not yet been observed directly.

The Reionization era began about 150 million years after the Big Bang (13.649 Bya). It is thought that the supernovae of the Population III, (Pop III), stars was the possible mechanism for the reionization. The end of the Reionization era was also the end of the Dark Ages. It ended about 1 billion years after the Big Bang.

Between 150 and 200 million years after the Big Bang (13.649 to 13.599 Bya) the Population II (Pop II) stars started to form.

Population II Stars were presumably created from interstellar gas clouds that emerged shortly after the big bang. They are relatively rich in hydrogen and helium but are poor in elements heavier than helium, containing 10 to 100 times less of these elements than Population I stars. Population II stars are mainly found in Globular clusters and the halo of both spiral and elliptical galaxies. Some are found in the bulge of galaxies. Those found in the galactic halo are older and thus more metal poor.

As the reionization intensifies, photons of light scatter off free protons and electrons, hence the early Universe becomes opaque again.

About 200 million years after the Big Bang (13.599 Bya) HD 140283, (the “Methuselah” Star), formed. Methuselah is a metal-poor sub-giant star about 200 light years away from the Earth in the constellation Libra, specifically towards the Ophiuchus constellation. This Population II star is the unconfirmed oldest star observed in the Universe. The oldest known star is SMSS J031300.36-670839.3 and it formed approximately 13.6 Bya. It is a star in the constellation Hydrus and is 6,000 light years from Earth.

These new elements seeded into neighbouring gas clouds by the supernova of Pop III stars. This in turn led to the formation of more Population II stars (metal poor) and gas giants in the early universe through gravitational collapse.

It is also thought that Population II stars through their own nuclear fusion and supernovas created all the other elements in the periodic table, except the more unstable ones. An interesting characteristic of Population II (Pop II) stars is that despite their lower overall metallicity, they often have a higher ratio of alpha elements (O, Si, Ne, etc.) relative to Fe as compared to Population I stars.

Protogalaxy (Primeval Galaxy) is the cloud of gas, which forms into a galaxy. It is believed that the rate of star formation during this period of galactic evolution will determine whether a galaxy is a spiral or elliptical galaxy. A slower star formation tends to produce a spiral galaxy. The smaller clumps of gas in a Protogalaxy form into stars. Population II (Pop II) [and much later Population I (Pop I)] stars would have formed in the bulge of these galaxies.

380 million years after the Big Bang (13.419 Bya) the oldest known quasar (UDFj-39546284) formed in the constellation Fornax.

A Quasar (QSO or quasi-stellar object) is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It has been theorized that most large galaxies contain a super massive central black hole with mass ranging from millions to billions of times the mass of our Sun.

400 million years after the Big Bang (13.399 Bya) GN-z11, the oldest-known galaxy, formed. GN-z11 is a high-redshift (z = 11.09+0.08; −0.12) galaxy found in the constellation Ursa Major.

Roughly 400 million years after the Big Bang (13.399 Bya), the universe began to come out of its Dark Age due to the process of reionization slowing and the clearing of foggy hydrogen gas. The Population III stars generation had ended in supernovas as they had finished burning their hydrogen fuel. The Population II stars were now dominating the early universe. The early universe started to become transparent to ultraviolet light for the first time. Due to mass star formation the early universe starts to heat once again.

Around 400 to 700 million years after the Big Bang (13. 399 to 13.099 Bya) Galaxy Clusters and Superclusters started to emerge.

A Galaxy Cluster (cluster of galaxies) is a structure that consists of anywhere from hundreds to thousands of galaxies that are bound together by gravity with typical masses ranging from 10¹⁴–10¹⁵ solar masses.

A Supercluster is a large group of smaller galaxy clusters or galaxy groups. They are among the largest-known structures of the cosmos. The Milky Way is part of the Local Group galaxy group, which contains more than 54 galaxies, which in turn is part of the Laniakea Supercluster.

420 million years after the Big Bang (13.379 Bya) the quasar MACS0647-JD, (the furthest known quasar), formed. It is a formation of the MACS0647-JD high redshift (z = 10.7 – 11) galaxy in the constellation Camelopardalis.

599 million years after the Big Bang (13.2 Bya) EGSY8p7 a high redshift (z = 8.68) galaxy formed in the constellation Boötes.

About 630 million years after the Big Bang (13.169 Bya) the oldest ever observed gamma ray burst (GRB 090423) occurred.

669 million years after the Big Bang (13.13 Bya) EGS-zs8-1 a high-redshift (z = 7.7) Lyman-break galaxy formed in the northern constellation of Boötes.

699 million years after the Big Bang (13.1 Bya) z8_GND_5296 a dwarf high-redshift (z = 7.5078) Lyman-alpha galaxy formed in the constellation Ursa Major.

889 million years after the Big Bang (12.91 Bya) SXDF-NB1006-2 a redshift (z = 7.213) galaxy formed in the Cetus constellation.

899 million years after the Big Bang (12.9 Bya) GN-108036 a redshift (z = 7.2) galaxy formed in the constellation Ursa Major.

919 million years after the Big Bang (12.88 Bya) IOK-1 a redshift (z = 6.96) galaxy formed in the constellation Coma Berenices.

The early universe gradually transitioned into our known observable universe as seen today. The Dark Age came to an end at about 1 billion years after the Big Bang (12.799 Bya) as the Reionization era ended due to the early universe becoming ionized.

A look at the Dark Age of our Universe — From Dark to Light

What Do You Think?

Was there a plan? Or was it a fluke?

The Dark Age lasted about 999,623 years, somewhere between 3.377 million years (13.795623 Bya) and 1 billion years (12.799 Bya) after the Big Bang. This was a miraculous period of darkness that laid the foundations for life!

The reionization was the silver lining of the dark gaseous clouds and the formation of stars and quasars provided light at the end of the dark tunnel of the early universe.

Our early universe has gone through its embryonic stage and is entering its fetus stage after struggling to survive. A wondrous development is soon to take place.

33 comments

From Nothing To Something

Robert Pollikett November 20, 2018

Did Our Universe Come From Nothing To Something?

Is your concept of our “Universe” limited or open to reason?
Is your universe limited to a particular sphere of activity or experience?

Honestly! If your universe is limited to you, then you need to get out more.
Engage yourself with the world around you. Go on a holiday, take a trip, go on outings or even join a social group and engage with people. You need to broaden your horizons and outlook on life.

Now! If you can get away from the city lights on a clear night, look up and gaze upon the stars. What you see in the night sky is just a drop in the bucket compared to what is really out there. Our universe is massive and in more ways than one.

Our universe is believed to be at least 10 billion light years in diameter and contains a vast number of galaxies; it has been expanding since its creation from the Big Bang about 13.799 billion years ago.

Our observable universe seems to be governed by laws of both physics and nature. The laws of nature are believed to be fixed. Chaos seems to come from strife and explosive situations. Then order comes about through nature and stabilizes the chaos. There is no doubt that our universe is of a grand design, but was it thought out and not just left to chance.

However, there is still discussion of how our universe came about and the application of both positive and negative energy in the acceleration of our universe and how they both balance each other out. Mankind has observed the sky for at least 6,000 years and has tried reason out what was observed and what role they, (the lights), played in their existence.

By Chance Or Was It Willed?

Did a photon cause it to happen? There would have been a flash of light.
Was it through the will of the Creator or just by chance?

It has been reasoned that to make a universe you need matter, energy and space. The effects of both positive and negative energy and how it affects our psychic has been thought about for years. If it affects us then it would play out in the universe, for we are one with the universe and cause and effect affects us all.

Mankind’s understanding of the observable universe flourished with Einstein’s E=MC² and the development of String Theory. There are four forces of nature and they are electromagnetism, gravity, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. String theory allows astronomers, astrophysicists, cosmologists and physicists to unite gravity with the three other forces. String theory also allowed them to change their view of the universe.

String theory opened the mind of scientists and allowed them to postulate many other theories such as the Perturbation theory, Inflation theory and the M-theory or brane.

The inflation theory led to the Eternal inflation model and the M-theory has now led into the ekpyrotic universe scenario. The ekpyrotic model is divided into various epochs (periods of time), based upon what influences dominate, such as: the big bang, the radiation-dominated epoch, the matter-dominated epoch, the dark energy–dominated epoch, the contraction epoch and the the big crunch.

From The Void And Darkness

Cosmologists are unsure what happened before the moment of the Big Bang. But since the universe must be at least as old as the oldest things in it, the age of the universe is the time elapsed since the Big Bang. The current measurement of the age of the universe is 13.799±0.021 billion years within the Lambda-CDM concordance model.

Never the less, (according to the Big Bang theory), the universe was born as a very hot, very dense, single point in space. Space was a particle desert consisting of a gravitational singularity about the billionth the size of a nuclear particle. It was small beyond belief. At the time of the explosion the Planck epoch or Planck era began. This is the earliest stage of the Big Bang, before the time passed and was equal to the Planck time (tP), or approximately 10⁻⁴³ seconds.

It has been theorized that about 10^-43 seconds after the Big Bang, the Grand Unification Epoch began when the infinitesimal sized early universe cooled down to 10³² K (Kelvins). Gravity separated and began to operate on the universe. The remaining fundamental forces stabilized into the electronuclear force, also known as the Grand Unified Force or Grand Unified Theory (GUT). This supposedly was mediated by (the hypothetical) X and Y bosons, which allowed early matter at this stage to fluctuate between baryon and lepton states.

The explosion of the Big Bang created Quantum Fluctuations. Quantum fluctuation is the temporary change in the amount of energy in a point in space, which allows the creation of particle-antiparticle pairs of virtual particles.

As the amount of these virtual particles grew exponentially, (at an incredible rate), our universe doubled in size at least 90 times. This burst of expansion is known as Cosmic Inflation and this started the Inflationary Epoch.

Cosmic inflation is a theory of exponential expansion of space in the early universe. This inflation generated both Gravitational and Density Waves, which still oscillate throughout the universe. This inflationary epoch lasted from 10⁻³⁶ seconds after the conjectured Big Bang singularity to sometime between 10⁻³³ and 10⁻³² seconds after the singularity.

It is during the time of the Cosmic Inflation that chaos arose due to the laws of thermodynamics. It has been proposed that WIMPS, (weakly interacting massive particles), or even dark matter or dark energy may have appeared and had been the catalyst for the expansion of the singularity.

Cosmic Inflation

About 10^-36 seconds the Electroweak Epoch begins. The early universe begins to cools down to 10²⁸ K (Kelvin). Hence the Strong Nuclear Force becomes distinct from the Electroweak Force. As the Strong Force separates from the Electroweak interaction there was high enough electromagnetism for the weak interaction to remain merged into a single electroweak force.

Maybe this separation fuelled the inflation (cosmology) of the universe.
It is also thought that a wide array of exotic elementary particles resulted from the decay of X and Y bosons, which include W and Z bosons and Higgs bosons.

10^-35 seconds after the Big Bang the infant universe cools further as it begins expanding outward. Its temperature drops down from 10²⁸ to 10²⁷ K. By now it is thought that the infant universe was almost completely smooth, with quantum variations beginning to cause slight variations in density.

10^-33 seconds after the Big Bang, Space of the infant universe was subjected to inflation and it expanded by a factor of the order of 10²⁶ over a time period of 10⁻³³ to 10⁻³² seconds. The early universe was supercooled from about 10²⁷ K down to 10²² K.

The Quark epoch began as the familiar elementary particles now formed as a soup of hot ionised gas called quark-gluon plasma. Perhaps the hypothetical components of cold dark matter, (such as axions), would have also formed at this time.

10⁻³² seconds after the Big Bang the Cosmic inflation came to an end.
During the inflationary epoch the early universe was filled with a dense, hot quark–gluon plasma. As the universe expanded and cooled, interactions became less energetic. However, particle interaction during this phase was energetic enough to create large numbers of exotic particles, including W and Z bosons and Higgs bosons.

Electroweak Phase Transition

When the early universe was about 10⁻¹² seconds old, W and Z bosons ceased to be created. The remaining W and Z bosons decayed quickly, and the weak interaction became a short-range force during the quark epoch.

10^-12 seconds after the Big Bang the Electroweak phase transition began and the Weak nuclear force became a short-range force as it separated from Electromagnetic force. This enabled matter particles to acquire mass and interact with the Higgs Field. The universe cools to 10¹⁵ K (Kelvin) and the temperature is still too high for quarks to coalesce into hadrons, so the quark-gluon plasma (Quark Epoch) persists. The four fundamental interactions now operate as distinct forces, i.e: electromagnetism, gravity, and the strong and weak nuclear forces of nature.

10^-11 seconds after the Big Bang, Baryogenesis may have taken place with matter gaining the upper hand over anti-matter as baryon to antibaryon constituencies are established.

Protons Formed

10^-6 seconds, (1 microsecond or 1us), after the Big Bang the Hadron epoch begins. As the early universe cools down to about 10¹⁰ K (Kelvin), a quark-hadron transition takes place. Quarks bind to form more complex particles, such as Hadrons. This quark confinement includes the formation of protons and neutrons (nucleons), the building blocks of atomic nuclei.

Nuclear Fusion Begins

0.01 seconds, (10 milliseconds or 10ms), after the Big Bang, Primordial Nucleosynthesis begins. Nuclear fusion begins as lithium and heavy hydrogen (deuterium) and helium nuclei form from protons and neutrons.

1 second after the Big Bang the Lepton Epoch begins. The universe cools to 10⁹ K (Kelvin) and the hadrons and antihadrons were deemed to annihilate each other leaving behind leptons and antileptons and the possible disappearance of antiquarks. Gravity by now tries to govern the expansion of the universe and neutrinos decouple from matter creating a cosmic neutrino background.

10 seconds after the Big Bang the Photon epoch began. Most of the leptons and antileptons have annihilated each other. By now the electrons and positrons are annihilating each other. The positrons then seemed to have disappeared and a small number of unmatched electrons are left over.

The early universe is dominated by photons of radiation. Ordinary matter particles are coupled to light and radiation, while dark matter particles start building non-linear structures as dark matter halos. The early universe becomes a super-hot glowing fog, because the charged electrons and protons hinder the emission of light.

By 3 minutes after the Big Bang this period of Nuclear Fusion ends.
Light chemical elements were created within the first three minutes of the early universe’s formation. As the universe expanded, temperatures cooled and protons and neutrons collided to make deuterium, which is an isotope of hydrogen. Much of this deuterium combined to make helium. The early universe is still under pressure and oscillates making sound waves as it pushes matter outwards.

Gravitational Collapse

By 20 minutes after the Big Bang the normal matter of the early universe consisted of 75% hydrogen and 25% helium and the free electrons begin scattering light. The early universe is still cooling and the pressure is lowered.

By 70,000 years after the Big Bang, [13.798,930,000 Billion years ago (Bya)] matter dominates the early universe, but its density and temperate started to come into play. What is known as the Jeans mass, started to take effect! Gravity started to pull the matter back towards the centre of the early universe.

Over time the Jeans length had an affect. The Jeans length is the critical radius of a cloud, [typically a cloud of interstellar dust (matter)], where thermal energy, (that caused the cloud to expand), is counteracted by gravity, which causes the cloud to collapse. As the early universe cooled, its pressure lowered and triggered the onset of the gravitational collapse.

Cosmic Microwave Background

About 380,000 years after the Big Bang, (13.798,620,000 Bya), as the early universe cooled even more, the newly formed atoms of mainly hydrogen and helium with traces of lithium quickly reach their lowest energy state, (ground state), by releasing photons, (photon decoupling). Matter cooled enough for electrons to combine with nuclei to form neutral atoms. This phase of events is known as “Recombination” and the absorption of the free electrons caused the universe to become transparent. The era of Recombination lasted for about 3,000 years.

The released photons of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) created the Afterglow Light Pattern that is still detectable today in the form of CMB radiation. It is also the oldest observation that we have of our universe.

However, the era of Recombination was followed by a period of darkness before stars and other bright objects were formed. The Dark Ages lasted about 1 billion years.

The formation of our early Universe — From the “Void” to the “CMB” as thought.

What Do You Think?

This narrative compilation was formed from the works of others.
But I thought this was the best way to explain the birth of our universe. But note, we have only gone from conception to the embryo stage in the development of our universe.

Was there a master plan for life? Was it all thought out by the will of the Creator? Or was it all by chance? Did our universe come from nothing to something? Anyway! I thought it was a rather miraculous development. What do you think?

12 comments

In The Beginning

Robert Pollikett October 30, 2018

Did Our Reality Start With The “Big Bang”?

Or was it the will of creative thought?

What was the catalyst behind, or even that of the “Big Bang”?
Did something implode and then explode due to quantum fluctuation?

Something had to exist in order to create an explosion and that something was energized. For quantum fluctuation to occur, energy and quantum particles had to exist. So! How did the quantum fluctuation start?

To understand quantum physics you have to get your head around “String Theorem”. String Theorem is based on thinking, postulating and mathematical application. For String Theorem to come into effect one has to consider the possibility of there being at least ten different dimensions and be open to the further possibility of there being even, eleven to twenty six dimensions.

This is mind blowing to many people who perceive themselves as to being associated to three dimensions. But if you believe that your reality is of three dimensions you are sadly mistaken. Our reality, (the common perception of our material realm), is of four dimensions. Our universe is moving due to momentum and so are we. All is related to time and time appears to be limited by the bounds of its cause. Hence all things have a beginning and an eventual end.

According to String Theory all begins with strings of energy. But nobody knows how this energy came about. However, those who are into Quantum Physics know that the perception of the quantum realm can change due to the thinking of the observer. So! Is the creation of the strings of energy due to the will of creative thought?

These strings of energy create fundamental forces. The type and amount of force depends on whether the strings of energy are either open or closed loops. Open strings of energy vibrate, twist and turn to form various patterns, however if their two ends meet and fuse together then a closed loop is formed and a particular quantum particle is created.

Now! Without going into too much depth. Quantum particles can form into sub atomic structure and create atoms. Atoms allow chemical change. Atoms and quantum particles form into molecules. Molecules allow structure to take place and material is formed. Molecules can wrap themselves around other molecules containing certain atoms and quantum particles and cell structure takes place.

Depending upon circumstances, two living cell types can be created such as prokaryotic (bacteria) and eukaryotic [(animal, plant, fungi and protoctista (unicellular organisms)]. Guess what? All of us human beings are made up of different types of eukaryotic cells and yes… we are animals and sadly, in more ways than one.

Hence! We are also stardust. For our universe consists of quantum particles and stars are created and destroyed through them. From dust we came, to dust we go: to one realm of existence or another.

But! Back To The “Big Bang”…

Did the first and second dimensions of existence meld together?
Did this combination make up the void of the third dimension or did all three dimensions somehow over lap each other. The overlapping of dimensions could and/or would cause quantum fluctuation. The reaction of which, either created or entered aspects of the other three dimensions into, the fourth dimension. This of course would cause one hell of a big bang.

It is thought that each dimension holds a different concept of reality.
Do the various dimensions vibrate and move within the boundaries of other dimensions? Do the different dimensions just kiss each other or do they infiltrate and cause chaos? Are there gateways between dimensions? If you could move between dimensions would you experience a different version of your own reality or would you experience a different realm of existence. Now that is something for you to think about. I hope you get a big bang out of it.

Never the less! Here we are, 13.73 billion years later, and no one has a real clue as to how our universe came about. But we know it did, because here we are, still postulating our origins and trying to work out who and what we really are.

What Is The Will Of Creative Thought

Well! You are a creative thinking, manifesting entity of free will.
Think upon it and work it out for yourself. You do have the ability to do so.
Just put your ego aside and open your mind, then test your preconceived ideas. The thoughts that you will have will either enhance your beliefs or destroy them.

It does not matter if you change your belief, as long as your new belief is righteous you will be on the right track and hopefully you will get a big bang out of your life.

29 comments

Subjective Thought

There Is More To Creation Than Meets The Eye

From Dust We Came

The Beginning Of Earth

Hadean Earth

Crusted Earth

Bombardment Of Earth

Our Earth

By The Plan

Under Construction

The Developing Neighbourhood

Location… Location… Location…

Finding The Right Abode

What A Buy!

In The Beginning

Nebula

Star Classification

Typical Living Stars

Stars that are Giants and Supergiants

Dead Stars

Star Disc

Star Clusters

Galaxies

Star Constellations

Enlightenment

Dark Matter and Dark Energy

Our Dark Side

Darkness﻿

How The Dark Age Began

The Dark Age﻿

What Do You Think?

Did Our Universe Come From Nothing To Something?﻿

By Chance Or Was It Willed?﻿

From The Void And Darkness

Cosmic Inflation﻿

Electroweak Phase Transition﻿

Protons Formed﻿

Nuclear Fusion Begins﻿

Gravitational Collapse﻿

Cosmic Microwave Background﻿

What Do You Think?﻿

Did Our Reality Start With The “Big Bang”?

But! Back To The “Big Bang”…

What Is The Will Of Creative Thought

Darkness

The Dark Age

Did Our Universe Come From Nothing To Something?

By Chance Or Was It Willed?

Cosmic Inflation

Electroweak Phase Transition

Protons Formed

Nuclear Fusion Begins

Gravitational Collapse

Cosmic Microwave Background

What Do You Think?