20 19 nobel prize in physics announced. Why did the universe begin?

Since 1970, James Peebles has been widely regarded as the world's leading theoretical cosmologist. In recent 50 years, peebles's theoretical views on physical cosmology have enriched the whole research field and laid the foundation for the transformation of cosmology from speculation to science. Xiao Award commented on him: "He laid the foundation for almost all modern cosmology research in theory and observation, and turned a highly speculative field into an accurate science." Its theoretical framework was developed in the mid-1960s, which is the basis of our contemporary world outlook.

We have all heard a story that the universe was born 654.38+0.4 billion years ago. At first, the temperature and density of the universe were very high. Since then, as the universe gets bigger and bigger, it has been expanding and getting colder. This simple story is the theme of The Big Bang Theory.

Less than 400,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe began to become transparent, and light was finally able to spread freely in space. Even now, those ancient radiations (called cosmic microwave background, abbreviated as CMB) still surround us and contain many secrets of the universe. Peebles used the theoretical tools he developed to explain these traces in the early universe and discovered new physical processes.

The discovery of Michel Mayol and Didier Queloz opened a revolution in astronomy and answered, "Are we alone in the universe?" .

1995 5438+00 In June, Meyer and Queloz announced the first discovery of an exoplanet outside our solar system, which orbits a sun-like star in our galaxy. At the Upper Provence Observatory in southern France, they observed the exoplanet 5 1 Pegasi b with customized instruments, which is a gaseous planet comparable to Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system.

This discovery triggered a revolution in astronomy. Since then, more than 4000 exoplanets have been discovered in the Milky Way. The strange new world is still being discovered, and its size, shape and orbit are unbelievable. They challenge our preconceptions about planetary systems and make scientists constantly revise their theories about the physical processes behind the origin of planets. With a large number of plans to find exoplanets, we may finally find the answer to the eternal question of whether there are other extraterrestrial life.

This year's Nobel Prize winner in physics changed our view of the universe. Peebles's theoretical discovery helps us to understand how the universe evolved after the Big Bang, while Meyer and Queloz explored our neighbors in the universe while searching for unknown planets. Their discovery changed our view of the world forever.