Astronomy 201
Cosmology
Dr. Don McCarthy (Professor)
Ms. Amy Stutz (Teaching Assistant)
Ms. Whitney Heudorf (Preceptor)
Mr. Nathan McBride (Preceptor)

ANNOUNCEMENTS Course grades are posted.

Today's Pictures & News Today's Sky The Known Universe Cosmology Astronomy The Sun Sun Historical Earth Space Weather Solar System Big Bang Sky Online Atmosphere Stars Timeline Universe Today Tonight Our Galaxy Universe Adventure Space Daily Satellites Galaxies Sloan Survey NASA & ESA CMB Animations

Explanation: The Cosmic Microwave Background is light that fills our Universe today and has extraordinary properties. Astronomers believe this light was emitted by the Universe itself when it went from being opaque to transparent as the first atoms formed about 380,000 years after the Big Bang. Since that time the Universe has expanded ~1000x and the CMB light has been redshifted into the radio portion of the spectrum. The CMB provides our longest lookback time into the history of the Universe. It contains information about the recipe of our Universe (dark energy, dark matter, light, atoms) and how the first stars and galaxies formed.