The universe is getting hot, hot, hot, a new study suggests

[Judi Lynn]

10-NOV-2020

Temperature has increased about 10 times over the last 10 billion years

OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The universe is getting hotter, a new study has found.

The study, published Oct. 13 in the Astrophysical Journal, probed the thermal history of the universe over the last 10 billion years. It found that the mean temperature of gas across the universe has increased more than 10 times over that time period and reached about 2 million degrees Kelvin today -- approximately 4 million degrees Fahrenheit.

"Our new measurement provides a direct confirmation of the seminal work by Jim Peebles -- the 2019 Nobel Laureate in Physics -- who laid out the theory of how the large-scale structure forms in the universe," said Yi-Kuan Chiang, lead author of the study and a research fellow at The Ohio State University Center for Cosmology and AstroParticle Physics.

The large-scale structure of the universe refers to the global patterns of galaxies and galaxy clusters on scales beyond individual galaxies. It is formed by the gravitational collapse of dark matter and gas.

"As the universe evolves, gravity pulls dark matter and gas in space together into galaxies and clusters of galaxies," Chiang said. "The drag is violent -- so violent that more and more gas is shocked and heated up."

More:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-11/osu-tui111020.php

[Throck]

1. Could external earthly factors factor into global warming?

If the deltaT of the universe gets greater then empirically the earth should get hotter.

[kurtcagle]

3. Not appreciably

It probably adds a few billionths of a Kelvin per year to the solar system. Over the course of billions of years, it could account for a couple of degrees heating, but that amount would get lost in the background noise.

[Blue Owl]

2. Hot Hot Hot!

[Chainfire]

4. At 4,000,000 F. it wouldn't take long to get a good tan.