NEW YORK: The Big Bang is how it all began, and the Big Rip is how it will all end.The universe will expand to such a degree that everything from galaxies to planets to atoms will be torn apart – and then vanish from view.
There’s no need to panic, however, as this sequence of events won’t happen for another 22billion years.
This is all according to scientists working at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee.
The idea of the Big Rip is that eventually even the constituents of matter would start separating from each other,’ mathematician Dr Marcelo Disconzi told the Guardian.
‘You’d be seeing all the atoms being ripped apart … it’s fair to say that it’s a dramatic scenario.’
The team at Vanderbilt examined distant supernovae to see whether the Big Rip was possible. The further away these supernovae are, the redder they seem because the light has been stretched out as it travels through space to reach us.
The Big Rip isn’t the only option for how we’ll meet our eventual demise. Alternative theories include the Big Crunch, where the Big Bang reverses and everything contracts, and the Big Freeze, where the university reaches a point where it’s so expansive it becomes too cold to sustain life.
