20 interesting facts on astronomy

Our universe is so big and weird to imagine. We do not know very much about our universe such as - What actually universe is? What is the shape of the universe? How did the universe come into existence? With what particles the universe is made of? What was there before big bang? ...... etc". So here are some interesting facts on astronomy and universe.

Interesting facts on astronomy:

1. First person to look at the sky with telescope:

Galileo was the first person who observed the sky with a telescope. Before him, nobody could ever imagine to look at space with any telescopes. He did it almost 400 years before.

2. May be alien lives:

When you gaze at the night sky, you see infinite numbers of stars. Some of them appears bigger and brighter than the others. But do you know that three out of five stars have their own solar system? In each and every solar systems, there are some planets which are in the Goldilocks zone (life habitable zone). Thus, there may be some alien lives.

3. Cry in space:

An interesting fact of space is that you cannot cry in space. When you will try to cry, the eye drops will form spherical balls and fly away from you. Hence the eye drops will never fall.
4. Water reservoir on space:

Researchers of California Institute of Technology (Caltech) discovered the largest and farthest water reservoir in space. It was found on a quasar which is 30 billion trillion miles away from us. This water vapour is 140 trillion times massive than the whole water of world's ocean and also 100,000 times massive than our host star sun.

5. Alcohol in space:

In the constellation of  Aquila, there is a large collection of ethyl alcohol which can fill up 400 trillion trillion bottles of wine. This giant alcoholic cloud is 1000 times larger than our solar system. But unfortunately, this giant cloud is 58 quadrillion miles away from us.

6. On venus a day is longer than one year:

On venus, a day is longer than one year. This sounds like weird and joke. But, venus takes 224.7 earth days to complete the whole orbit around the sun (we call it a year) whereas, it takes 243 earth days to complete the rotation around its own axis (we call it a day).

7. For getting taller go to space station:

Most of the astronauts become almost 2 inches taller in space station. This is because, gravity does not work there. They are falling freely to earth's curvature, that is why they feel zero gravity.

8. Space-time curvature:

Einstein's general theory of relativity proved that space and time do not exist individually. Rather, they fuse together to form fourth dimensional space-time fabric. Massive objects warps space-time curvature just like a heavy ball warps a stretched rubber sheet. Due to this phenomenon gravitational force occurs.

9. Universe is expanding:

The universe has been expanding since the beginning of it. The most acceptable theory is the inflation theory. According to this theory, the universe began with a massive explosion which we now call The Big Bang Theory. After that, it expanded dramatically and till now it is expanding by doubling its size in every 10-34 seconds. We cannot identify the shape of the whole universe as it is expanding greater than the speed of light. But the scientists identified the shape of the observable universe which looks like a spherical cylinder and diameter is almost 93.2 billion light years.

10. We are the children of supernova:

Supernova is one of the dangerous and greatest events in the cosmos. Supernova forms at the end of some stars' lives. In this Link you will find the article explaining about life of stars. The supernova explosion gives birth to new elements like iron, nickel, gold, platinum etc. The earth is also made up of such types of materials, that is why we can find such materials on earth. In fact we are also made up of particles created by supernova. Thus, we are also the children of supernova. It can create lives and also destroy it.

11. Seven states of matter in the universe:

In high school we learnt that there are three states of matter: Solid, Liquid and Gas. But these three were not alone in the universe. Scientists have discovered seven different states of matter including these three. The seven states of matter are - solid. liquid, gas, plasma, Bose-Einstein condensate, Quark-gluon plasma and Degenerate matter.

12. Time Travel is possible theoretically:

Using Einstein's theory of special and general relativity, one can travel back and forth in time theoretically. According to general theory of relativity: time slows down near gravitational field. This is why black hole can be used as natural time machine. It also predicts about wormholes which combines two different spaces and timeline into a single one allowing not only travel faster than light but also time travel. But according to special theory of relativity time slows down as we move faster and faster. When the speed of object becomes equal to speed of light, time stops for the moving object. This allows time travel.

13. Vacuum is not completely vacuum:

We all know that space is vacuum. Vacuum means empty or nothing. But vacuum is not completely vacuum. In space, there exists some virtual particles. They are called virtual because, such kinds of particles cannot be detected by normal detectors. Their existence was revealed by Lamb shift. Lamb shift is a difference in energy of two different energy levels 2S_1/2 and 2P_1/2 of hydrogen atom.

14. Big bang was not a unique event:

According to some astronomers and theoretical physicists, our universe is not alone. Maybe big bang did not happen only one time. It happened in past, it is happening right now somewhere else and it will happen in future. This allows the multiple number of universes, which they call Multiverse. But we cannot feel them as we are very far away from them.

15. What will happen if you fall in a black hole:

If you fall in a black hole you can never get back out from there. Black hole warps space-time in such a way that gravity becomes so strong and objects fall inside it gets spaghettified and destroyed. The black hole will not kill you until you reach the event horizon. After reaching this magical point, you will be spaghettified and thrown to nothingness. Thus it creates Information Paradox. However, one of the greatest physicist Stephen Hawking proposed Hawking Radiation which means, black holes also radiate some kind of radiations in space. By emitting radiation, it also evaporates and at the end it gets vanished in space.

16. Diamond planet:

Scientists found an alien planet which was made largely of diamond. The name of the diamond planet is 55 cancri e. It is also called Super-Earth because it is  rocky planet and moves round like earth to its host star. It takes only 18 hours to complete its orbit to the star. A research revealed that its interior contained most of carbon which is the main reason of having large collection of diamonds. But we can never go there, because that star system is located 4,000 light years away from us.

17. Invisible universe:

Astronomers and theoretical physicists calculated that only almost 5% of universe is visible. The rest 95% is the invisible universe which we can never see. Out of 95% of the universe, 21% is made up of dark matter and 74% is made up of dark energy.

18. Gamma ray burst:

The most dangerous event in the cosmos is the gamma ray burst. This happens when a black hole eats up everything and could not hold its internal energy. Then it ejects pulses of gamma radiation from its core portion in the both direction. If a pulse of such gamma ray burst goes through earth, it will destroy the whole life within a fraction of second.

19. Light from past:

We all know that sunlight takes 8 minutes 22 seconds to reach the earth from sun. But actually, it takes 100,000 years to reach the surface of the sun from its core portion. This means, now we are experiencing the light of 100,000 years before.

20. A planet which is darker than even coal:

Astronomers detected a strange planet located in the constellation of Draco the Dragon, which reflects less than 1% of incident light from its host star. That is why it is darker than even coal found in earth. The name of the planet is TrES-2b.It moves round to its host star GSC 03549-02811 and it is located 750 light years away from us.

Besides these, there are infinite numbers of secrets and interesting facts of our universe. The universe is so big and so weird to imagine. But here, I tried to cover most of the topics. Thanks for reading.