Best Map Ever of the Universe

This image shows an oval that represents the whole sky if you folded it out onto a flat piece of paper. The oval is dotted with many regions ranging from blue, green, yellow and red in color. While the image looks chaotic, the blue regions are nearly always surrounded by green. The yellow are embedded in the green, and red embedded in the yellow. These show temperature differences in the early universe, which ultimately lead us to see where matter clumped together to form the structures we see today.
March 21, 2013
CreditESA and the Planck Collaboration
Historical DateMarch 21, 2013
Language
  • english

This map shows the oldest light in our universe, as detected with the greatest precision yet by ESA's (European Space Agency's) Planck mission. The ancient light, called the cosmic microwave background, was imprinted on the sky when the universe was 370,000 years old.