Looking back twenty years, I recall what seems like a simpler time. Then the big debate in astronomy was whether the universe was 10 or 20 billion years old, and I thought we would know the answer by 2011. It might, however, be “none of the above”.
According to NASA’s WMAP satellite, the universe is 13.75 billion years old – with a margin of error of 0.11 billion years. As always, gazing into the cosmic crystal ball is a risky exercise, but I am going to predict where astronomy might be headed in the next forty years.
The Dark Universe
Not only were we wrong when we guessed the age of the universe, we asked the wrong question. Far more urgent is “What is the universe made of?” We now know that only 5% of the universe is normal matter – protons, atoms, electrons, etc. The remainder is either dark matter or dark energy, neither of which we understand.
By 2051, I think astronomers will be able to explain the nature of dark matter and dark energy – a paradigm shift that will require complete revision of standard models of cosmology.
Earth-like planets
Although astronomers changed the number of planets in our own solar system from nine to eight in 2006, they have discovered hundreds of planets orbiting other stars. Before 2051, we will likely identify and map the surfaces of other planets similar to Earth – rocky bodies around 12,000 KM with year-long orbits around sun-like stars. We’ll see clouds, oceans, continents and ice caps, and perhaps evidence of life. Plans should also be in place to launch high-speed robotic probes with the capability of visiting distant worlds and transmitting details.
Gravity Waves
Einstein’s Theory of Relativity states that moving bodies create waves in space-time that spread across the universe at the speed of light. Right now we are being squeezed and stretched by gravitational ripples from black holes billions of light years away. At least, that is the unproven theory.
By 2051, I predict that a future Nobel Prize winner will have detected gravity waves, and their study will be a well-accepted component of contemporary astrophysics. The use of “gravity-wave telescopes” to study yet unknown cosmic phenomena will be routine.
Only time will tell how accurate my predictions are. It is just as likely this debate will have become passé by that time. The future may be even more exciting that anything I have proposed.
