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Graphical timeline from the Big Bang to the heat death of the universe

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Visual representation of the universe's past, present, and future
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Find sources: "Graphical timeline from the Big Bang to the heat death of the universe" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (August 2021)

This is a timeline of the Universe from the Big Bang to the heat death scenario. The different eras of the universe are shown. The heat death will occur in around 1.7×10 years, if protons decay.

If protons decay

Proton decayBlack dwarfSunGalaxy formation and evolutionChronology of the universe#Habitable epochCosmic microwave background radiationTimeline of the Big Bang#Recombination, photon decoupling, and the cosmic microwave background (CMB)Matter-dominated eraBig Bang nucleosynthesisInflationary epochPlanck timeReionizationChronology of the universe#Dark AgesPhoton epochLepton epochHadron epochQuark epochElectroweak epochGrand unification epochGraphical timeline of the Stelliferous EraGraphical timeline of the Big BangHeat death of the universeBig BangPlanck epoch

If protons do not decay

Big Bang nucleosynthesisInflationary epochPlanck timeReionizationChronology of the universe#Dark AgesPhoton epochLepton epochElectroweak epochGraphical timeline of the Stelliferous EraGraphical timeline of the Big BangHeat death of the universeBig BangPlanck epoch

Scale

Usually the logarithmic scale is used for such timelines but it compresses the most interesting Stelliferous Era too much as this example shows. Therefore, a double-logarithmic scale s (s*100 in the graphics) is used instead. The minimum of it is only 1, not 0 as needed, and the negative outputs for inputs smaller than 10 are useless. Therefore, the time from 0.1 to 10 years is collapsed to a single point 0, but that does not matter in this case because nothing special happens in the history of the universe during that time.

s = { log 10 ⁡ log 10 ⁡ y e a r if  y e a r > 10  , corresponding to  y e a r = 10 10 s 0 if  0.1 ≤ y e a r ≤ 10 − log 10 ⁡ ( − log 10 ⁡ y e a r ) if  y e a r < 0.1  , corresponding to  y e a r = 10 − 10 − s {\displaystyle s={\begin{cases}\log _{10}\log _{10}year&{\mbox{if }}year>10{\mbox{ , corresponding to }}year=10^{10^{s}}\\0&{\mbox{if }}0.1\leq year\leq 10\\-\log _{10}(-\log _{10}year)&{\mbox{if }}year<0.1{\mbox{ , corresponding to }}year=10^{-10^{-s}}\end{cases}}}
Comparison of log10 and log10log10 scales
year log10 year combination of log10log10 year and
-log10(-log10 year)
10 10000 4
10 1000 3
10 100 2
10 10 1
10 2 0.30
10 1 0
10 0 undefined but here forced to 0
10 -1 0
10 -2 -0.30
10 -10 -1
10 -100 -2
10 -1000 -3

The seconds in the timescale have been converted to years by s e c o n d / 31557600 {\displaystyle second/31557600} using the Julian year.

See also

References

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