The Big Bang theory describes the universe's origin from an extremely hot, dense state around 13.8 billion years ago, followed by rapid expansion and cooling that continues to this day.
During the first fraction of a second—an era called inflation—the universe expanded exponentially, smoothing and flattening space. After inflation ended, the universe consisted of a highly energetic plasma of particles and radiation.
Within minutes, protons and neutrons combined to form light elements (hydrogen, helium, deuterium, and small amounts of lithium) in a process known as Big Bang nucleosynthesis.
About 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe cooled enough for electrons and nuclei to combine into neutral atoms. This allowed photons to travel freely, producing the Cosmic Microwave Background—the oldest light we can observe.
Over time, gravity amplified slight density variations in the plasma, leading to the formation of stars, galaxies, and large-scale structures.
Key evidence supporting the Big Bang includes the expansion of space (observed via galaxy redshifts), the abundance of light elements, and the precise measurements of the Cosmic Microwave Background by missions such as COBE, WMAP, and Planck.
Modern cosmological models (ΛCDM) incorporate dark matter and dark energy, explaining current observations of cosmic acceleration, geometry, and composition.
30 May 2016
How did the universe evolve from such a smooth beginning? To help understand, computational cosmologists and NASA produced the featured time-lapse animated video depicting a computer simulation of part of the universe. The 100-million light-year simulation starts about 20 million years after the Big Bang and runs until the present. After a smooth beginning, gravity causes clumps of matter to form into galaxies which immediately begin falling toward each other. Soon, many of them condense into long filaments while others violently merge into a huge and hot cluster of galaxies. Investigating of potential universe attributes in simulations like this have helped shape the engineering design the James Webb Space Telescope, currently scheduled for launch in late 2018.