How The Planck Satellite Forever Changed Our View Of The Universe
Humanity’s greatest-ever view of the Big Bang’s leftover glow has just released their final analysis. Here’s what we’ve learned.
It’s been more than 50 years since humanity discovered a uniform bath of low-energy, microwave radiation originating from all regions of the sky. It doesn’t come from the Earth, the Sun, or even the galaxy; it originates beyond every star or galaxy we’ve ever observed. While it’s discoverers didn’t know what it initially was, a group of nearby physicists were in the midst of designing an experiment to look for that exact signature: the theoretical leftover glow from the Big Bang.
Initially known as the primeval fireball, we now call in the cosmic microwave background (CMB), having measured its properties exquisitely. The most advanced observatory to ever measure its properties is the European Space Agency’s Planck satellite, launched in 2009. The satellite took its full suite of data over many years, and the scientists working on it have just completed and released their final analysis. Here’s how it’s changed our view of the Universe forever.
