Newly Discovered Quasar Defies Age of Universe

http://techzwn.com/2011/06/distant-quasar-marks-the-brightest-object-ever-found-video/

by jjp9999 • 15 years ago

57 23 15 years ago

j2d2j2d2• 15 years ago

Why does this defy the age of the universe?

There wasn't enough time for the black hole to grow as large as this one is (was). If X is how much material it would consume per billion years, it is sitting 4X when you universe is only two billion years old and should have only been 2X (note: I don't know the actual magnitude of the numbers, but am basing my numbers off the six-foot kindergartner comment).

hugh3• 15 years ago

In this case I'd wager that our model of how quickly quasars can form is probably what needs revising, rather than the age of the universe.

But, y'know, standard-issue overly-dramatic science-journalism headline.

cynest• 15 years ago

It doesn't necessarily. It is an object that due to current models of quasar formation should not exist at that point in time. This means that there is something wrong with those or current estimations of the age of the universe. The latter is less likely.

VladRussian2• 15 years ago

yes, we are trying to estimate the behavior, mass, luminocity, etc... of the objects in the Universe that was several times smaller than it is now, ie. the space itself was much more "dense" (for lack of a better word) and the matter "warmer" - was the Universe behaving like it does today? We know that the fundamental forces behave differently ( at least quantitatively-wise ) when the matter is "hot". So our estimations may be several orders of magnitude wrong, and finds such as this help to adjust our theories and estimates.

r00fus• 15 years ago

Are we sure that these large objects aren't being "lensed" into looking further than they are?

Isn't the third possibility that these quasars are illusory?

VladRussian2• 15 years ago

"The quasar was found after five years of searching through databases containing images of millions of objects."

sounds intriguing... How available is the survey data? Last time i checked for example - the GRB observatory in South America - that one publishes only small percent of the data.

colkassad• 15 years ago

while not the same project, Google 'sdss casjobs', register, and start doing some cosmic sql queries!

splat4• 15 years ago

It's mostly public. The data used for this discovery was taken from UKIDSS, an IR sky survey (you can get data here: http://surveys.roe.ac.uk:8080/wsa/SQL_form.jsp) and SDSS, an optical survey (you can get data here: http://www.sdss3.org/dr8/data_access.php). All SDSS data is available to the public. UKIDSS data can only be accessed by ESO member countries for the first year, but after that becomes public. (I worked on a similar project to discover a high-z quasar as a summer research project in college, though unfortunately with less success.)

scotty792• 15 years ago

http://www.szot.eu/

tl;dr Big bangs are fueled by annihilation. Matter-antimatter asymmetry is local. Most of the matter always existed as blackholes. Existence, space and time didn't start at Big Bang. Observable universe is extremely small part of whole space.

Awaiting to have a crackpot index assigned. ;-)

sigzero• 15 years ago

Nah, you are no crackpot. That is as good as any other theory I have heard. :)

scotty792• 15 years ago

Thanks. Now to the hard part: Design an experiment. :-)

adobriyan• 15 years ago

> Observable universe is extremely small part of whole space.

Inflation theories actually make this very statement and have good reasons behind it.

StrawberryFrog• 15 years ago

I am not a physicist, but...

Does the matter/antimatter distinction have any relevance to black holes? I though that they erased all features of the mass that they swallowed.

What does it mean for an object to be composed "mainly of antimatter" as opposed to "completely of antimatter"? Surely an object that is "mainly antimatter" will rapidly turn into an object that is entirely antimatter plus some photons.

Newly Discovered Quasar Defies Age of Universe

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