Latest news with #BigCrunch
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
When will the universe die?
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Scientists have a pretty good idea of how our universe began: According to the Big Bang theory, an infinitely small, dense point rapidly expanded 13.8 billion years ago, and the universe has been experiencing accelerating expansion ever since. However, trying to imagine where our universe might go next, or even how and when it might eventually end, is still fiercely debated. "In physics, we can only trust our ideas and theories when we gather the data that test them and confirm them," Nemanja Kaloper, a professor of physics at the University of California, Davis, told Live Science in an email. "[But] in cosmology that is notoriously difficult since the experiments are passive — we cannot recreate the universe to see how things go and improve the data sets at will." So, exactly when will the universe end? That depends on which theory you find the most convincing. Two of the top leading theories are called the Big Freeze and the Big Crunch. Related: Could a black hole devour the universe? For Henry Tye, a professor emeritus of physics at Cornell University, the most likely scenario is the "Big Freeze." "This is what is already happening right now," Tye said. "The universe's expansion will become faster and continue for 100 billion years, a trillion years or forever. There's no end point." One cosmological model that explains this expansion is the idea that our universe is expanding toward an area called "de Sitter space," which is a part of space with intrinsic positive energy that may be helping push the universe outward. This means that the universe wouldn't necessarily end, but it wouldn't stay the same, either. As the name implies, the Big Freeze would dilute energy in the universe by so much that any form of activity — such as the burning of stars or the churning of black holes — would come to an end. This is what physicists call the "heat death of the universe." However, it's also possible that this positive de Sitter space could one day decay into negative energy, which would reverse the direction of the universe. "That would [mean] the Universe expands for a bit before reaching a max and then turns around," Antonio Padilla, a professor of physics at the University of Nottingham in the U.K., told Live Science in an email. "Such a universe would end in a crunch." This "Big Crunch" would essentially reverse the expansion of the Big Bang and erase our universe. The spooky thing about this scenario, Tye said, is that it might already be happening in pockets throughout the universe, but it would be largely undetectable because evidence of those areas of space would be erased. Some recent models have predicted that a Big Crunch, driven by dark energy — the mysterious force driving the accelerated expansion of the universe — could begin as soon as 100 billion years from now. In particular, this timeline was determined by studying a theoretical model of a type of dynamical dark matter called "quintessence." Conversely, in a paper Padilla contributed to in 2021, he found that the universe has at least another trillion years left — which he said was on the shorter end of estimates. This determination was made using the ideas of string theory, which imagines particles as tiny 1-dimensional strings instead of points. Even then, the universe might not be ready to stop existing completely. Some scientists believe that a Big Crunch may just be part of a larger cycle of expansion and contraction that took place in the early universe called a Big Bounce. In this idea, the universe would "start" with rapid expansion (i.e. a Big Bang) and expand for a while before eventually collapsing again into the conditions necessary for another Big Bang. As for which theory is correct, it's hard to say with total certainty, Padilla said. "Predicting the far future is hard," he said. "My view is that observations can only take us so far here because of the very nature of what we are dealing with." RELATED MYSTERIES —Does the universe rotate? —What happened before the Big Bang? —Do quantum universes really exist? Even if none of these theories is correct, there may still be an expiration date on when all the regular matter in the universe — stars, galaxies, and even remnants of dead stars, such as black holes — will simply cease to be. Due to a type of spontaneous radiation predicted by Stephen Hawking, everything in the universe could slowly evaporate to nothing, a 2025 study published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics suggests. The proposed timespan for this total evaporation is 1 quinvigintillion years — that's 1 followed by 78 zeros, or 1078. According to Tye, there is no one piece of evidence that could fully prove a theory about the universe's fate. Instead, cosmologists must improve existing models of our universe and extrapolate them infinitely. Gaining a better understanding of complicated topics like dark energy and string theory is one way scientists can better predict where our universe is going.
Time of India
19-05-2025
- Science
- Time of India
Will universe end far earlier than expected?
For most of the past generation, astronomy textbooks treated the cosmos as practically immortal. Students learned that after the last red dwarf flickered out, after the final black hole evaporated, darkness would stretch on for a number written with more than a hundred zeros. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now New research led by a group at Radboud University in the Netherlands asks us to erase most of those zeros. Their calculations show that the universe could finish its drawn-out fade after 'only' ten to the power of seventy-eight years. That still dwarfs every human timescale, yet within cosmology it represents a surprisingly quick goodbye. The revision starts with 's famous idea that are not completely black. According to , they emit tiny amounts of energy, lose mass, and eventually disappear. The Dutch team wondered whether any extremely dense, gravitationally bound object might share that fate. They applied the same mathematics to white dwarfs, which are the hot, Earth-sized cores that remain when sun-like stars exhaust their fuel. A white dwarf appears solid and inert, but the new paper argues that quantum fluctuations at its surface allow particles to leak away. Over unimaginableperiodse the entire star would evaporate, just as slowly and inevitably as a lake dries under the desert sun. Once white dwarfs are allowed to vanish, every late-stage forecast of must be compressed. Traditional models pictured those stellar remnants cooling into lightless 'black dwarfs' that wander the void forever. Take them out of the script, and the slowest actors exit much earlier, chopping hundreds of orders of magnitude from the final curtain call. Suddenly, the last sparks of matter are gon, not long after the last black hole, and the universe slides into an empty quantum haze with shocking speed—at least by cosmic accounting. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now While theorists digested that prospect, another group studying the large-scale expansion of space introduced a second, equally dramatic possibility. Data from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument hint that dark energy, the mysterious force pushing galaxies apart, may itself be fading. If future surveys confirm the trend, the outward rush could eventually stall, reverse, and race toward a catastrophic 'Big Crunch. ' Such a collapse would end everything far sooner than either the black-hole timetable or the newly shortened evaporation clock. The evidence is still thin, but the mere suggestion stirs debate and underscores how fragile our grandest predictions remain. None of these scenarios changes life on Earth. Our Sun will still swell into a red giant in about five billion years. Long before any deep-time physics matters, continents will shift, oceans will boil, and perhaps our descendants or their machines will have moved elsewhere. Yet cosmologists care deeply because the ultimate fate of the universe tests whether quantum theory and gravity truly mesh. A single adjustment in the equations can shrink eternity, proving that seemingly untouchable numbers are only as sturdy as the assumptions beneath them. So, will the cosmos end in a graceful fade after ten to the seventy-eighth years, or will dark energy flip the sign on gravity and pull everything back in a fiery finale? No one knows yet. What the new work makes clear is that our picture of 'forever' is still a draft, and every fresh observation has the power to shorten or lengthen the longest story ever told.
CBS News
13-05-2025
- Science
- CBS News
Universe will die "much sooner than expected," new research says
Could dark energy cause the universe to collapse? The universe is poised to die much faster than previously thought, according to new research by Dutch scientists. But there's no great need to panic. We still have 10 to the power of 78 years before it happens — that's a one with 78 zeroes. However, that is a major revision from the previous estimate of 10 to the power of 1,100 years, notes the research paper from Radboud University, published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics. "The final end of the universe is coming much sooner than expected but fortunately it still takes a very long time," said lead author Heino Falcke. A trio of scientists at Radboud set out to calculate when the most "durable" celestial bodies — white dwarf stars — would eventually die out. They based their calculations on Hawking radiation, named after celebrated British physicist Stephen Hawking. Hawking postulated in the mid-1970s that black holes leak radiation, slowly dissolving like aspirin in a glass of water -- giving them a finite lifetime. The Radboud scientists extended this to other objects in the universe, calculating that the "evaporation time" depends on density. This enabled them to calculate the theoretical dissolution of the longest-lasting body, the white dwarf. "By asking these kinds of questions and looking at extreme cases, we want to better understand the theory, and perhaps one day, we can unravel the mystery of Hawking radiation," said co-author Walter van Suijlekom. Humankind needn't worry too much about the end of the universe. Unless we escape planet Earth, we'll be long gone. Scientists think that our sun will be too hot for life in about a billion years, boiling our oceans. In about eight billion years, our star will eventually expand towards the Earth, finally gobbling up our by-then barren and lifeless planet and condemning it to a fiery death. Shedding light on dark energy The research comes just weeks after scientists released new findings that may also shed light on the fate of the universe. Researchers in March said new data shows dark energy — a mysterious force that makes up nearly 70% of the universe — may actually be weakening. If dark energy is constant, an idea first introduced by Albert Einstein in his theory of relativity, scientists say our universe may continue to expand forever, growing ever colder, lonelier and still. If dark energy ebbs with time, the universe could one day stop expanding and then eventually collapse on itself in what's called the "Big Crunch." "Now, there is the possibility that everything comes to an end," said cosmologist and study collaborator Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki of the University of Texas at Dallas. "Would we consider that a good or bad thing? I don't know." This image provided by NSF's NOIRLab shows the trails of stars above Kitt Peak National Observatory, where a telescope is mapping the universe to study a mysterious force called dark energy. NSF's NoirLab via AP Other efforts around the globe have an eye on dark energy and aim to release their own data in the coming years, including the European Space Agency's Euclid mission and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. Launched in 2023, the ESA's $1.5 billion Euclid space telescope is equipped with a near-perfect 3-feet 11-inch-wide primary mirror and two instruments: a 600 megapixel visible light camera and a 64-megapixel infrared imaging spectrometer. The telescope's field of view is roughly twice the size of the full moon.
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Universe will die "much sooner than expected," researchers say
The universe is poised to die much faster than previously thought, according to new research by Dutch scientists. But there's no great need to panic. We still have 10 to the power of 78 years before it happens — that's a one with 78 zeroes. However, that is a major revision from the previous estimate of 10 to the power of 1,100 years, notes the research paper from Radboud University, published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics. "The final end of the universe is coming much sooner than expected but fortunately it still takes a very long time," said lead author Heino Falcke. A trio of scientists at Radboud set out to calculate when the most "durable" celestial bodies — white dwarf stars — would eventually die out. They based their calculations on Hawking radiation, named after celebrated British physicist Stephen Hawking. Hawking postulated in the mid-1970s that black holes leak radiation, slowly dissolving like aspirin in a glass of water -- giving them a finite lifetime. The Radboud scientists extended this to other objects in the universe, calculating that the "evaporation time" depends on density. This enabled them to calculate the theoretical dissolution of the longest-lasting body, the white dwarf. "By asking these kinds of questions and looking at extreme cases, we want to better understand the theory, and perhaps one day, we can unravel the mystery of Hawking radiation," said co-author Walter van Suijlekom. Humankind needn't worry too much about the end of the universe. Unless we escape planet Earth, we'll be long gone. Scientists think that our sun will be too hot for life in about a billion years, boiling our oceans. In about eight billion years, our star will eventually expand towards the Earth, finally gobbling up our by-then barren and lifeless planet and condemning it to a fiery death. Shedding light on dark energy The research comes just weeks after scientists released new findings that may also shed light on the fate of the universe. Researchers in March said new data shows dark energy — a mysterious force that makes up nearly 70% of the universe — may actually be weakening. If dark energy is constant, an idea first introduced by Albert Einstein in his theory of relativity, scientists say our universe may continue to expand forever, growing ever colder, lonelier and still. If dark energy ebbs with time, the universe could one day stop expanding and then eventually collapse on itself in what's called the "Big Crunch." "Now, there is the possibility that everything comes to an end," said cosmologist and study collaborator Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki of the University of Texas at Dallas. "Would we consider that a good or bad thing? I don't know." Other efforts around the globe have an eye on dark energy and aim to release their own data in the coming years, including the European Space Agency's Euclid mission and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. Launched in 2023, the ESA's $1.5 billion Euclid space telescope is equipped with a near-perfect 3-feet 11-inch-wide primary mirror and two instruments: a 600 megapixel visible light camera and a 64-megapixel infrared imaging spectrometer. The telescope's field of view is roughly twice the size of the full moon. Josh's mom on making a move What will Pope Leo XIV mean for the Church? Why flights were delayed again at Newark airport even though backup system worked
Hamilton Spectator
10-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Hamilton Spectator
KFC Canada Suits Up for the Whiteout with Kyle ‘F' Connor Bucket Takeover
WINNIPEG, Manitoba, May 10, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — This playoff season, KFC Canada goes full Whiteout to celebrate Jets pride – bucket style. In a bold tribute to Winnipeg's legendary playoff tradition, KFC dropped a custom-designed Whiteout bucket for Game 2 tonight at Canada Life Centre, with one unmistakable facelift: Jets left-winger and fan favourite, Kyle Connor – aka 'KFC' himself. It's a fan-fueled fusion of hockey pride and fried chicken glory, made to rally the city up for the team's playoff run. The custom-designed KFConnor bucket was handed out to fans inside the arena to wear for Game 2. As a proud partner of the Winnipeg Jets, KFC is bringing the hype beyond the bucket – replacing the iconic Colonel branded signs outside the restaurant at 1275 Portage Avenue with the KFConnor bucket design. The KFConnor bucket will also take over KFC Canada's social channels and pop up across the city in bold, can't miss advertising – continuing to fuel Whiteout pride across the city. ' We're always looking to show up in a way that's bold, creative, and with a distinct local relevance ,' said Lauren Pottie, Senior Manager, Media, Partnerships & Regional Marketing at KFC Canada. ' The Whiteout is such an iconic ritual – full of pride, passion and community spirit. Partnering with the Winnipeg Jets – and Kyle 'KFC' Connor – felt like a natural connection to bring something fun and memorable to the table, literally.' The Whiteout isn't the only thing heating up the streets – KFC Canada is serving up game-day energy all playoffs long with two unbeatable deals. Fans can score the iconic Big Crunch sandwich for just $4.95 on Jets game days at participating Winnipeg KFC locations. For fans across the country, it's Chicken Night in Canada with the Game Night Bundle delivering big-time flavour for just $35. Packed with 6 pieces of Original Recipe Chicken, 6 Hot Wings, Large Popcorn Chicken, Large Fries, and 3 Dips, it's made for sharing—and made for game day. Both offers are the perfect way to rally the crew, fuel up, and turn every game into a celebration. Because nothing brings people together coast-to-coast like crispy chicken, playoff passion and a shot at glory. Imagery for download here . About KFC Canada Founded by Colonel Harland Sanders in 1952, KFC is the world's most popular chain of chicken restaurants. To this day, the Colonel's own blend of 11 herbs and spices is used to season our Original Recipe® chicken and remains a very closely guarded secret. While KFC's specialty is our famous Original Recipe® chicken, KFC also features a variety of freshly prepared sandwiches and wraps, on the go snack items, home-style sides, desserts and beverages. Today Kentucky Fried Chicken Canada Company (KFC Canada) is a subsidiary of YUM! Brands, Inc., which operates more than 23,000 restaurants in more than 140 countries and territories around the world. KFC Canada has more than 600 locations right here in Canada. To learn more about KFC Canada, visit our website . About Winnipeg Jets The Winnipeg Jets Hockey Club is a National Hockey League (NHL) franchise passionately supported by one of the most fervent hockey markets in the world. Leveraging the Winnipeg Jets brand that dates back 40+ years, the current franchise is focused on and committed to a long-term draft and develop strategy. From the capacity crowds at Canada Life Centre, to the 'True North' shout-out during the national anthem, the Winnipeg Jets are a cherished hockey brand that has been embraced by both our regional market and hockey fans around the world. For media inquiries, images, or interviews, please contact: Aaron Short 905-442-1923 A photo accompanying this announcement is available at
