How Scientists Found the Universe’s First Type of Molecule

NASA has just discovered how the hot particles after the Big Bang settled down and created the very first molecule in the universe.

A Dead Satellite Is Unlocking the Secrets Lurking Beneath Antarctica -

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First Astrophysical Detection of a Very Special Molecule

"When temperatures in the early Universe had fallen below ~4,000 K, the light elements produced in the Big Bang began to combine. Ionized hydrogen interacting with neutral helium created the “Universe’s first molecular bond” in the helium hydride ion (HeH+). Destruction of HeH+ created one of the earliest paths to forming molecular hydrogen (H2), the most abundant and significant molecule in the Universe."

The Early Universe

"Hubble’s discovery was the first observational support for Georges Lemaître’s Big Bang theory of the universe, proposed in 1927. Lemaître proposed that the universe expanded explosively from an extremely dense and hot state, and continues to expand today. Subsequent calculations have dated this Big Bang to approximately 13.7 billion years ago. In 1998 two teams of astronomers working independently at Berkeley, California observed that supernovae – exploding stars – were moving away from Earth at an accelerating rate. This earned them the Nobel prize in physics in 2011. "

What Powered the Big Bang?

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