Big Questions
The purpose of this section is to show the great quantity of questions we can solve from the data obtained along this research. Some of them may not seem to be related with this work at all, thus it is a must to look out of the box! All of them can be answered with the knowledge you already have!
For all the questions you will see, there are smalls triangles at their beginning ▸. Click on them to have clues of the answer and see how it is related with my project.
❝“I... a universe of atoms, an atom in the universe.”
Richard P. Feynman
Why are supernovas important in life?
Supernovae are so powerful they create new atomic nuclei. As a massive star collapses, it produces a shockwave that can induce fusion reactions in the star’s outer shell. These fusion reactions create new atomic nuclei in a process called nucleosynthesis.
Supernovae are considered one of the original sources of the elements heavier than iron in the Universe. Even the iron in your blood can be traced back to supernovae or similar cosmic explosions from long before our Sun had formed. Supernovae are thus essential to life.
Are we stardust?
Carl Sagan, one of our generation's greatest science educators, popularized one unbelievable fact—we are stardust. Meaning, most of the atoms in our body were formed inside of stars, supernovae, and neutron star collisions.
Every atom of oxygen in our lungs, of carbon in our muscles, of calcium in our bones, of iron in our blood - was created inside a star before Earth was born. Hydrogen and helium, the lightest elements were produced in the Big Bang.
As the Universe is supposed to be expanding, are we (humans) doing so too?
It is quite usual to ask about what actually expands in an expanding universe.
We proved that the Universe (at our scale) is not isotropic, which means that the space expansion (demonstrated in our project from type Ia supernovae) cannot be applied to our scale. Thus, we (humans) are not expanding.
Why are bigger and more expensive telescopes constantly needed? Are those (such as the James Webb Telescope) going to make science go further meaningfully?
Further means more in past when it comes to time. This is essential for astronomens, based on something like "touching" the past to reach the future.
Bigger telescopes signify knowing more about our past, how it was like, compare it with present hypothesis, reject and propose new ones...
Consequently, yes, this financial inversion makes science go further meaningfully. You can check some of the mysteries that the new data provided by the James Webb Telescope is causing.
Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe
Are there questions we cannot still answer? Why? Will we be able to solve these mysteries at some point?
In contrast with the previous questions, there will not be a clear answer for the following questions. Some clues, hypothesis, ideas... may be shown for some of them.