- #1
Pavel
- 84
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Hi, I just saw the premier of "Birth of the Universe" on Naked Science (National Geographic) and had a couple of questions as a result, which I'm hoping somebody could answer.
First, they said that the reason we have matter and no evidence of anti-matter is because when energy was converted into matter/anti-matter particles in the early universe (after quark/anti-quark pair production), the amounts were disproportionate. There was more of matter, in the amounts of one part per 10 billion (is that the baryonic number?). Well, fine, but wouldn't that imply that the mass of the observable universe would be dominated by mass in the form of energy from the early annihilation process? If the baryonic number is so small, then matter would be sooo small percentage of the total mass. The popular "mass pie chart" shows, however, that the total mass is about 75% dark energy, 20% dark matter, 5% baryonic matter (luminous and non), less than 1% - radiation. Where is the mass/energy from the annihilation ??
Secondly, they said the elements heavier than iron were forged by exploding cores of supernovas, which produce enough energy to forge heavy elements. I always thought that fusing heavy elements consumes energy, which would inhibit the process of fusion, as the energy required to produce really heavy nuclei wouldn't be available due to it being consumed by lighter heavy elements. I thought the heavy elements were produced by neutron capturing, some of which would later turn into protons via weak force interactions and decay. I know I couldn't have come up with that stuff on my own, I read about it somewhere... So, did I read some crackpot or an outdated theory??
In advance, thanks!
Pavel.
First, they said that the reason we have matter and no evidence of anti-matter is because when energy was converted into matter/anti-matter particles in the early universe (after quark/anti-quark pair production), the amounts were disproportionate. There was more of matter, in the amounts of one part per 10 billion (is that the baryonic number?). Well, fine, but wouldn't that imply that the mass of the observable universe would be dominated by mass in the form of energy from the early annihilation process? If the baryonic number is so small, then matter would be sooo small percentage of the total mass. The popular "mass pie chart" shows, however, that the total mass is about 75% dark energy, 20% dark matter, 5% baryonic matter (luminous and non), less than 1% - radiation. Where is the mass/energy from the annihilation ??
Secondly, they said the elements heavier than iron were forged by exploding cores of supernovas, which produce enough energy to forge heavy elements. I always thought that fusing heavy elements consumes energy, which would inhibit the process of fusion, as the energy required to produce really heavy nuclei wouldn't be available due to it being consumed by lighter heavy elements. I thought the heavy elements were produced by neutron capturing, some of which would later turn into protons via weak force interactions and decay. I know I couldn't have come up with that stuff on my own, I read about it somewhere... So, did I read some crackpot or an outdated theory??
In advance, thanks!
Pavel.