I think this is cool stuff.  It makes you wonder, as big as our universe is, how big is it really???  We could be as tiny as microscopic organisms to someone/something else.  Reality can be boggling.  We could be a universe floating amongst other universes all part of a collective HUGE thing. 

Physicists Create Universe Smaller Than a Marble

Image from Pingnews

At Lancaster University, they’re unraveling the secrets of how to build a universe. In fact, they have already formed one, or something very much like it. This scientific breakthrough lies in the bottom of a chamber no larger than your pinky finger, filled with helium and cooled to 0.0003 degrees Fahrenheit above absolute zero.

By placing helium in a state which most closely resembles the form it held at the beginning of the universe, scientists have created an opportunity for the gas to go through several low-energy evolutions. These defects in space-time, are represented by tiny whirlpools in the helium, which are created by the rapid expansion, and equally rapid slowing of the expansion; something that it’s believed our own universe did at the big bang and in the moments thereafter.

How, then, did our universe go from whirlpools that could fit in a thimble to galaxies larger than our imaginations can properly comprehend? Physicists, ever ready with their dry wit, have deemed these phenomena “inflation.” Nobody knows how this works or why, this happened; vast amounts of energy aren’t something you’d like to replicate in a lab. Black holes and supernovas aren’t pleasant lab partners. It’s quite evident to the researchers however, that inflation, or something very much like it took place and, lacking the ability to do field research of lab trials, they have built scale models. This is where the tiny galaxies come in.

The theory being presented by the physicists in Lancaster University is that inflation is the product of violent competition: a series of collisions between universes known as “3-branes;” a term related to string theory which I’m frankly not smart enough to explain to you. Suffice to say that our universe is one, because it exists in 3-5 dimensions.

What the string theorists claim is that in a collision of two 3-branes, or two different modes of pure helium like that containing the mini-galaxy, the universe will rapidly expand and stop instantly, mimicking the halting advance of the universe’s growth. Remarkably, when super cooled helium in different phases is mixed, it does exactly that: symmetries in the solution disappear, and aberrations form; the first step in several that lead to the forming of galaxies out of nothing. The secrets of the universe it seems, aren’t safe for long.

nuclear iran or curious physicist- not sure what worries me more.

earth is just a seed waiting to blow up and pollinate

Lol, I think these guys watched Men In Black and said, we can do that!

And they DID!

Or vice versa, but the first way is more funny...

Originally posted by unconformed

nuclear iran or curious physicist- not sure what worries me more.

earth is just a seed waiting to blow up and pollinate

I tend to be a little less pessimistic.  I don't give in to the fear that some are trying to instill in us.  Far as I'm concerned, they can go to hell with their attempts to manipulate our minds and deter from our progress.

It's Da Big Bizang!!

Don't be ridiculous: We all know that god did it; those physicists should be burned at the stake for witchcraft.

Lets all hope that our universe still provides relevant data to whatever lab it is running in, else they may decide to end the experiment.

Originally posted by //\\//\\oo

Don't be ridiculous: We all know that god did it; those physicists should be burned at the stake for witchcraft.

 

Thats a pretty cool project though, I have often wondered if our universe is just a microscopic part of a greater universe.

Gotta be careful!! May upset some of the atheist types. Means that our universe may be something that belongs to something bigger.. Cannot have that!Next thing you know some crazy quack will actually study I.D.

Then talk about a uproar among the peeps who think there is no greater achievement in the universe than the ego-centric man.

I know the why to the "No one knows why".  God snapped his fingers, there solved.