Making a Cosmic Calendar

Understanding when important events in the evolution of our universe happened relative to each other can be very difficult for us to comprehend. In this activity, you will be making a cosmic calendar with all the events compressed into the scale of one year.

1. Using 60 s = 1 min, 60 min = 1 h , 24 h = 1 day and 365 days = 1 year, calculate the age of the universe in years (use scientific notation), if today is approximately 4.7 X 1017 s from the Big Bang.


2. Let the age of the universe you calculated in #1 equal one calendar year. Find the following

divide cell above 1 calendar year = years4.7 X 1017 seconds
by 365 1 calendar day = yearsseconds
by 24 1 calendar hour = yearsseconds
by 60 1 calendar minute = yearsseconds
by 60 1 calendar second = yearsseconds

3. Use the numbers from #2 to determine the time from "January 1st" and then the Calendar date on your cosmic calendar for each of the following events. Show a sample calculation.

Sample Calculation for an event happening 3.0 X 1012seconds after the Big Bang
3.0 X 1012s / 8.9 X 1011s/calendar min = 3.37 cal. min
so 3 min + [(0.37)(60 sec/min)= 22 sec] = 0:03:22 on Jan. 1
Use military time 0:00:00 to 24:00:00


Historic Events in an Inflationary Big Bang Cosmology

Event Time from
Big Bang		 Calendar Date Calendar Time
Quantum Gravity Era Begins 1 X 10-43 s 1/1 within first sec.
Inflation/Symmetry Breaking Era Begins 1 X 10-38 s 1/1 within first sec.
Quark/Lepton Era Begins 2 X 10-7 s 1/1 within first sec.
Radiation Era Begins 1 X 102 s 1/1 within first sec.
Matter Era Begins 4 X 1012 s / :   :
Data taken from Niel Brandt's Cosmological Timeline
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