Astronomy
Astronomy
1st Edition
ISBN: 9781938168284
Author: Andrew Fraknoi; David Morrison; Sidney C. Wolff
Publisher: OpenStax
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Chapter 29, Problem 30E

It is possible to derive the age of the universe given the value of the Hubble constant and the distance to a galaxy, again with the assumption that the value of the Hubble constant has not changed since the Big Bang. Consider a galaxy at a distance of 400 million light-years receding from us at a velocity, v. If the Hubble constant is 20 km/s per million light-years, what is its velocity? How long ago was that galaxy right next door to our own Galaxy if it has always been receding at its present rate? Express your answer in years. Since the universe began when all galaxies were very close together, this number is a rough estimate for the age of the universe.

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Using our example from the previous unit, let's try to determine the Hubble time for this example universe. You were given that a good representative galaxy receded at a speed of 4000 km/s and was found to be 20 Mpc away. With that in mind, what would the age of that universe be in years (aka what is that universe's Hubble time)? Go ahead and take the number of kilometers per Mpc to be approximately 3.1*10^19 km/Mpc. While this problem may look scary at first, this is really just bringing you full circle to one of the unit conversion problems you encountered at the beginning of this course.
It is possible to derive the age of the universe given the value of the Hubble constant and the distance to a galaxy, again with the assumption that the value of the Hubble constant has not changed since the Big Bang. Consider a galaxy at a distance of 235 million light-years receding from us at a velocity, v. If the Hubble constant is 20.5 km/s per million light-years, what is its velocity? (Enter the magnitude in km/s.)   _________ km/s
If a galaxy is 8.9 Mpc away from Earth and recedes at 497 km/s, what is H. (in km/s/Mpc)? km/s/Mрс What is the Hubble time (in yr)? years How old (in yr) would the universe be, assuming space-time is flat and the expansion of the universe has not been accelerating? years How would acceleration change your answer? If the expansion of the Universe has been accelerating, the Universe could be substantially younger than the value entered above. If the expansion of the Universe has been accelerating, the Universe could be substantially older than the value entered above.

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