• Question: Can the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation give us any clue or even prove the existence of parallel universes?

    Asked by rajathjackson to Dave, David, Jack on 26 Jun 2013.
    • Photo: Jack Miller

      Jack Miller answered on 26 Jun 2013:

      Hi Rajath,

      To be honest, this is getting way away from my field (I’ve not done much cosmology), but in short: possibly. The Cosmic Microwave Background is amazingly homogeneous, but has little bits of disorder in it, and it’s these that are the subject of much active research. It’s likely that they’ll tell us things about the formation of the early universe, and it’s not inconceivable to think that different cosmological theories could predict different behaviours for the early Cosmic Microwave Background. I suspect that it’s a really hard challenge, but then I don’t know all that much about these areas!

      Hope that helps

      — J

    • Photo: David Freeborn

      David Freeborn answered on 26 Jun 2013:

      Hi rajathjackson,

      Yes, we might be able to use Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMB) to do precisely this .

      If “eternal inflation” theory is correct, then new Universes are forever springing into existence, just as our Universe did. These Universes might occasionally collide with each other. Such a collision would involve huge bursts of energy, and if our Universe were still inflating at the time, this would leave behind a “signature” in the cosmic microwave background.

      Such collisions would leave a signature in the CMB- and some cosmologists think we’ve spotted four of these. Others disagree: this is very controversial right now.

      But Penrose, who I definitely rate highly, thinks the arguments are persuasive. So we might, just *might* have already found evidence of other Universes in the CMB!

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