New high-definition pictures of the baby universe from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (IMAGE)
Caption
Research by the Atacama Cosmology Telescope collaboration has led to the clearest and most precise images yet of the universe’s infancy, the cosmic microwave background radiation that was visible only 380,000 years after the Big Bang.
This new sky map has put the standard model of cosmology through a rigorous new set of tests and show it to be remarkably robust. The new images of the early universe, which show both the intensity and polarization of the earliest light with unprecedented clarity, reveal the formation of ancient, consolidating clouds of hydrogen and helium that later developed into the first galaxies and stars.
A new image of the cosmic microwave background radiation, adding high definition from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope to an earlier image from the Planck satellite. The zoom-in is 10 degrees across, or twenty times the Moon’s width seen from Earth, and shows a tiny portion of the new half-sky image. Orange and blue show more or less intense radiation, revealing features in the density of the universe when it was less than half a million years old - a time before any galaxies had formed. The image includes closer-by objects: the red band on the right is the Milky Way, and the red dots are galaxies containing vast black holes, the blue dots are huge galaxy clusters, and the spiral Sculptor Galaxy is visible towards the bottom.
Credit
ACT Collaboration; ESA/Planck Collaboration
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