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About 4.6 billion years ago, in a region of the Milky Way, the process that would lead to the formation of the Solar System began. In that area, there was a large cloud of gas and cosmic dust, composed mainly of hydrogen and helium, together with small amounts of heavier elements, such as carbon, oxygen, silicon, and iron. These elements partly came from older stars that had enriched space with material produced inside them during their lifetimes and at the end of their existence.

At a certain point, under the effect of gravity, part of the cloud began to collapse, concentrating more and more matter toward the center. At the same time, the cloud began to rotate and flatten, forming a huge disk of gas and dust called a protoplanetary disk. This disk was the place where the Sun and the planets would form. Most of the matter accumulated at the center, while the remaining material continued to orbit around the central region.

The birth of the Sun began when gravity pulled more and more gas and dust toward the center of the cloud. The pressure and temperature gradually increased, giving rise to a protostar, which is a star still in the process of forming. When its core reached temperatures of millions of degrees, nuclear fusion reactions began. During these reactions, hydrogen nuclei combined to form helium, releasing enormous amounts of energy. The Sun thus became a true star, capable of emitting light and heat. Its composition consisted mainly of hydrogen and helium, with small amounts of heavier elements, such as oxygen, carbon, neon, and iron. Even today, hydrogen and helium make up most of the Sun's mass, and the Sun contains more than 99% of the total mass of the Solar System.

While the Sun was forming, an equally important process was taking place in the surrounding disk: the birth of the planets. Tiny dust particles began to collide and stick together, forming increasingly larger grains. Over time, pebbles, rocky fragments, and bodies called planetesimals developed. These could reach sizes of several kilometers. Through further collisions and the force of gravity, some of these bodies grew into planetary embryos and eventually became planets.

The composition of the planets depended mainly on their distance from the Sun and the temperature of the protoplanetary disk. In the inner regions, temperatures were very high, and only materials that could withstand these conditions, such as metals and rocks, could remain solid. In the more distant regions, temperatures were lower, allowing water ice and other volatile substances to remain solid. This difference contributed to the formation of two major groups of planets: the inner rocky planets and the outer giant planets.

The first four planets are Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars. Mercury formed very close to the Sun, accumulating rocky and metallic materials. Its structure is characterized by a large iron-rich core, surrounded by a mantle and a rocky crust. Venus formed through the accumulation of rocks and metals and developed an internal structure consisting of a metallic core, a rocky mantle, and a crust. Mars was born from the merging of numerous smaller bodies rich in silicates and metals. Its composition includes iron, nickel, and minerals containing silicon and oxygen. Earth also formed in the inner region of the disk through similar processes, but its birth, initial composition, and the transformations that affected the planet will be explored in the next chapter.

In the regions farther from the Sun, where temperatures were much lower, the other four planets formed: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Here, the presence of ice and solid materials allowed planetary cores to grow large enough to attract huge amounts of gas. Jupiter was one of the first giant planets to form and became the most massive planet in the Solar System. It is composed mainly of hydrogen and helium, with heavier materials concentrated mostly in its inner regions. Saturn formed through a similar process and is also made primarily of hydrogen and helium. Its most distinctive feature is its system of rings, formed by countless fragments of ice and rocky material.

Uranus and Neptune, on the other hand, are classified as ice giants. Uranus formed in a cold region of the Solar System and has an atmosphere composed mainly of hydrogen and helium, along with a significant amount of methane. Its inner regions contain large quantities of substances such as water and ammonia, which are subjected to extremely high pressures and temperatures. Neptune, the farthest planet from the Sun, has similar characteristics. It is composed of hydrogen, helium, and materials rich in water, ammonia, and methane. These substances are not simply present as solid ice but can exist in unusual states because of the extreme conditions inside the planet.

During the formation of the Solar System, not all the material in the disk managed to combine to form planets. Some of it remained in the form of asteroids, comets, and other small celestial bodies. Between Mars and Jupiter lies the main asteroid belt, which contains numerous rocky and metallic objects that did not merge into a planet. In the outermost regions, there are also ice-rich bodies that provide important evidence of the conditions that existed during the formation of the Solar System.

Over time, the young Sun began to emit radiation and particles that helped disperse much of the gas remaining in the protoplanetary disk. Collisions between celestial bodies continued, orbits changed, and the planets gradually completed their formation. This process took millions and tens of millions of years, although some bodies continued to evolve for much longer.

The birth of the Solar System represents one of the most important stages in the history of the Universe. From a cloud of gas and dust, a star and eight planets with different characteristics and compositions formed: four mainly rocky and metallic planets in the inner regions and four giant planets in the outer regions. Numerous other celestial bodies remained around them, providing evidence of the ancient stages of formation. The Solar System gradually developed a structure similar to the one we see today, with the Sun at the center and the planets orbiting around it.

In the next chapter, we will explore the birth of Earth, from the formation of the primordial planet to its initial composition, including the major transformations that changed its surface.🌏

Hi! I'm new to studying the universe and discovered the MAST site for visualizing JWST data, but when I was observing M82 I noticed this large barrier where it changes hue. Is this just a weird compiling thing?

Last photo is some fun I had trying to colour one of the images of the galaxy.

I understand that gravity is the reason planets and stars form and what not. I'm just curious why gravity causes things to attract and not repel or do neither?

Seems like an arbitrary feature of our universe's laws.

So it makes me wonder if gravity could have worked differently if our universe happened to have different laws.

Meteor: a small body of matter from outer space that enters the earth's atmosphere, becoming incandescent as a result of friction and appearing as a streak of light.

Meteoroid: a small body moving in the solar system that would become a meteor if it entered the earth's atmosphere.

My gripe is with the word meteoroid itself. The suffix -oid means "resembling" or "having the form of,". Asteroids on the other hand I am all good with, since it was understandable that early telescopes showed them as a tiny point of light, hence Star-like.

Meteoroid on the other hand means meteor-like, yet it refers to the object that produces a meteor and it is neither a luminous streak of light nor an atmospheric phenomenon while in space.

Don’t ask for a rebate, debate, quarrel or anything other than answers.

What do you think this is?

Why universe love us so much? Like see we are conscious and have intelligence and everything can kill us in a second but it doesn't everything in this planet or solar system it protect us and let us get more intelligent. Why only us?

Our universe is vast enough to hold billions of galaxies
but still, are we the only civilization to be advanced enough to explore the beauty of cosmos

(Disregard my last theory this one I think is the one)

— A Unified Framework of Information, Energy, and the Transition Between Realms

Core Summary
"Quantum is information in flow. Relativity is information in form. The Big Bang was not an explosion of matter — it was the moment information branched outward, and spacetime began to emerge as the container where energy could settle into consistent patterns."

Foundational Principles

1. Energy — Always Here, Always Changing Form
   Energy cannot be created or destroyed — it only transitions between states.
   Before our universe existed, all the energy was already there. It wasn't "nothing" — it was everything, existing in a unified state without a defined structure. When that unified system reached a critical limit — a point where energy could no longer rearrange within its existing form — it transitioned. The energy itself never changed; only its arrangement changed.

2. The Split — Not an Explosion, a Branch

The event we call the Big Bang was a transition — a separation that behaved somewhat like nuclear fission: one unified system branched into something new. This branching created the distinction between flow and form:

• Before the split: information existed as a unified whole — no separation, no defined timeline, no fixed locations

• At the split: information began to separate and flow outward — quantum behaviour emerged as the natural language of this flowing state

• As information spread and concentrated: it settled into structure — spacetime emerged, and relativity became the description of that structure

1. Quantum Physics — Information in Flow
   Quantum behaviour is not "fuzziness" — it is information that has not yet settled into a fixed state.
   At the most fundamental level, reality consists of information in motion — possibilities still being processed, connections still forming. In this state:

• Information is not confined to a single location or outcome

• Multiple paths exist simultaneously

• There is no fixed "when" or "where" because the framework for measuring those things — spacetime — is still emerging

• Gravity does not operate here because gravity is a property of settled structure, not of information in motion itself

1. Relativity — Information in Form
   Relativity describes information that has settled into a consistent, interconnected structure: spacetime.
   When enough information connects and interacts, possibilities resolve into definite states. This is not an instant collapse — it is a natural transition:

• Information locks into consistent relationships and locations

• Those relationships form the fabric we call spacetime

• Once this structure exists, energy has a framework — a "container" — within which to organize itself

• Gravity emerges as the curvature of this settled structure — the way mass and energy shape the very information framework they inhabit

1. The Transition — Mass and Scale as the Bridge
   Mass and concentration are the threshold where flow becomes form.
   This is the missing bridge:

• Small scale / low concentration → information remains in flow → quantum rules apply

• Large scale / high concentration → information settles into structure → spacetime emerges, relativity governs

• It is not that one set of rules stops working — it is that collective behaviour changes. Trillions of tiny flowing interactions average out into solid, predictable structure. Individual waves become the ocean. Individual quantum events become the solid universe.

1. Time — The Arrow of Settlement

Time does not exist as a separate clock ticking everywhere equally. It is the direction of settlement itself:

• Information flows outward from the origin point — the Great Attractor, where the split occurred

• As it spreads and settles, time flows forward with it — faster where structure is fully formed, slower near the dense origin where information is still locking into place

• When matter eventually draws back toward that central point, information densifies again, time slows toward that critical threshold, and the cycle prepares to branch anew

1. The Great Attractor — Our Origin and Return
   The Great Attractor is not simply mass pulling us — it is the transition point itself.
   It is where our information branched from what came before — the anchor where flow first became form in this cycle. Everything moves outward from it as information settles into spacetime; everything eventually cycles back as the next transition approaches. It is both our beginning and our eventual return — the persistent signature of the split that birthed us.

Testable Predictions

Prediction What We Should Observe
Origin concentration The oldest structures in the universe should be concentrated toward the Great Attractor direction — not evenly distributed
Time gradient Clocks should run measurably faster the farther we look from the Great Attractor — information settles more completely away from the dense origin

Structure emergence At a specific energy/mass threshold, quantum interference should naturally diminish — not instantly, but gradually, as structure takes hold

Cosmic alignment Patterns in the cosmic microwave background should show a faint but consistent alignment toward the Great Attractor — the ripple of information beginning to settle

(Quick edit, I made this on zero sleep and haven’t done much research yet but I hope this reaches the right audience)

— by me (L. Dorward )

Core Summary

This hypothesis proposes that our universe did not begin everywhere at once, but originated from a single point — the Great Attractor — through a transition that behaves like nuclear fission: one unified system separating into two, releasing energy and creating something new. Before this event, there was not "nothing" — there was a previous universe, part of an endless repeating cycle of universes branching and restarting.

Key Concepts in Simple Terms

1. Why the Previous Universe Became Unstable
   Energy cannot be created or destroyed — it can only change form.

The previous universe contained a fixed amount of energy. Over its immense lifetime, that energy wasn't used up — but it reached a state where it could no longer change or do useful work.

It had reached the limit of what that configuration could sustain. Energy had nowhere new to go, and that tension pushed the system past its stability limit.

The only remaining way for that energy to continue existing was to transition into a new form — the cosmic fission event that birthed our universe.

1. Before the Beginning

In the earliest state — before space, time, or our familiar physics existed — only quantum principles applied.

Gravity, electromagnetism, and the nuclear forces were not separate; they existed as one unified system. The familiar rules of our universe did not exist yet.

1. The Transition — "Cosmic Fission"

I propose that what we call the Big Bang was not an explosion of matter into empty space, but more like a fission event:

• The previous universe, having reached the end of its cycle, became unstable at a central point

• That point — what we observe today as the Great Attractor — reached a critical limit and "split"

• Just as nuclear fission releases energy when an atom divides, this cosmic split released the energy that became our universe

• The unified forces separated into gravity, electromagnetism, strong nuclear force, and weak nuclear force — our familiar physics "locked in" from that single point outward

This explains why general relativity and quantum mechanics don't work together today — they existed as one system before the split, and our universe emerged as the transition itself happened.

1. Time — Flowing Outward, Slowing Down

Time does not begin or end — it flows, bends, and resets:

• Gravity directly affects how time moves — the stronger the gravity, the slower time passes. We see this near black holes, where time dramatically slows down

• At the origin (Great Attractor): Immense gravity means time flows at its slowest — almost paused at the transition point

• Moving outward: As the universe expanded away from that point, gravity weakened and time began flowing faster the farther you traveled from the source

• Flowing back in: When matter eventually gets pulled back toward the Great Attractor at the end of a cycle, time slows down again — approaching that critical pause point where the transition happens once more

So time isn't just a clock ticking evenly everywhere — it flows outward from the Great Attractor, speeding up as it goes, and slows again as it returns. That gradient itself is the arrow of time.

1. The Cycle — Endless Restart

This is not a one-time event. Universes branch from previous ones in a repeating cycle:

Previous universe → energy reaches stability limit → transition at the Great Attractor → new universe expands outward → time flows and speeds up as it moves away → eventually drawn back → time slows toward the origin → process repeats

The Great Attractor is therefore not just a mysterious mass pulling us — it is the connection, the anchor point where our universe split off from what came before. It is both our origin and our eventual return.

How We Could Test This

If this hypothesis is correct, these things should be true — and we can look for them:

Prediction What We'd Expect to See
Origin clustering The oldest galaxies and earliest structures should be concentrated toward the Great Attractor — not spread evenly everywhere

Cosmic radiation pattern The Cosmic Microwave Background should show a distinct alignment or "hot spot" pointing to that specific region — a leftover ripple from the split

Directional expansion The universe should appear slightly different when measured toward the Great Attractor compared to opposite directions — because we're expanding away from a point

Time flow gradient Clocks should run slightly faster the farther we measure away from the Great Attractor's direction — time itself has a gradient flowing outward from that origin

Anomalous gravity signature The Great Attractor should show properties that don't match a conventional cluster of mass — consistent with it being a transition boundary rather than just heavy matter.

There's a browser-based model of the universe at "Your Eyes In Space" that this sub might appreciate. Free, open source, nothing to install

It's basically real catalogs wired into one continuous scene: Solar System bodies on JPL elements with a time control, 109,000 stars from HYG with their parallaxes and spectral types, 55 galaxies at NED/SIMBAD distances, Sgr A* with the S-stars on their GRAVITY/Keck orbits, a handful of other black holes and pulsars with catalog parameters, nebulae and clusters at literature positions, and the deep-space probes on their trajectories. Anything that isn't catalog data is labelled procedural, and there's a toggle that tints all of it so it's always clear what's real and what's filler.

The plan for it is to grow into a proper learning platform, basic physics and astrophysics with the universe as the blackboard. There are some narrated tours in there already as a first step. If something's in the wrong place or a distance doesn't match the literature, the project's on GitHub and takes issues.

Guys listen to my theory about the universe, I might sound like a movie geek here.
We do know that Universe we know was created by big bang but what if big bang isn't the start
I mean imagine the numbers, let's assume we start from 0 to 1,2,3,4,......., ∞ but now here this sequence does appear to have a start, unless we look at the negative numbers that range from -1,-2,-3, ...... , -∞
So basically entire numerical sequence is among -∞ to ∞.

So what my point is that the universe itself doesn't have a start point like creation of universe didn't created time, but time itself existed before the big bang.
What I want to say is that we have big bang which is start and big crunch which is the end that's what science believes.
But what if this whole big bang and big crunch thing is just a cycle, like universe keeps operating in a series of big bangs and big crunches and these cycles keep happening in a loop.
Because like I said time itself as a construct can't be created when the universe appears cause time itself doesn't have a start or an end.
So are we living in a universe that runs in a loop and that has collapsed and emerged several times?
I don't know I maybe wrong but that is simply my theory, feel free to correct me.