Just before I went to sleep I saw this on the ticker of BBC News24 and decided to see if I could find an article on the subject:

http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-sci ... e-big.html

I'm wondering what everyone thinks is the implication of this? Do you think this brings us truly any closer to the notion of a cyclical universe? I had always thought that a recollapsing universe had been thrown out with the observed effect of dark energy. I'm not so up to date on my physics any more so I'd love it if someone more learned could lend their opinion.

Cheers

Bribase wrote:Just before I went to sleep I saw this on the ticker of BBC News24 and decided to see if I could find an article on the subject:

http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-sci ... e-big.html

I'm wondering what everyone thinks is the implication of this? Do you think this brings us truly any closer to the notion of a cyclical universe? I had always thought that a recollapsing universe had been thrown out with the observed effect of dark energy. I'm not so up to date on my physics any more so I'd love it if someone more learned could lend their opinion.

Cheers

This is evidence that's been quoted in support of the hypothesis discussed in this thread.

The idea is that our current expansion phase will indeed not recollapse, but will serve as the seed for a new expansion phase. This is extremely tentative at the moment and far from being universally accepted.