Mikroaaltovalosta

Mikroaaltovalosta, also known as microwave background radiation, is a faint glow of electromagnetic radiation that pervades the entire universe. It is considered a remnant of the Big Bang, the explosive event that is believed to have created the universe. This radiation is primarily in the microwave portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, hence its name.

The discovery of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) was accidental. In 1964, Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, while working at Bell Labs, detected a persistent, uniform noise in their radio antenna that they could not account for. This noise was isotropic, meaning it came from all directions in space with equal intensity. Their research, combined with the theoretical work of physicists like George Gamow and Ralph Alpher who had predicted such radiation, led to the identification of the CMB.

The CMB is remarkably uniform in temperature, with a blackbody spectrum corresponding to a temperature of about 2.7 Kelvin (-270.45 degrees Celsius or -454.81 degrees Fahrenheit). However, there are tiny temperature fluctuations, or anisotropies, within the CMB. These variations are extremely important because they represent the seeds of the large-scale structures we observe in the universe today, such as galaxies and galaxy clusters. Studying these anisotropies has provided cosmologists with crucial data to understand the age, composition, and evolution of the universe. Missions like COBE, WMAP, and Planck have significantly improved our measurements and understanding of the CMB.