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BLOCK 11: UNIVERSAL PROCESSES

Introduction

Universal processes refer to the physical interactions that occur throughout the time and space of the Universe. The block first investigates the present-day structure of the Universe and discovers clues about its past history. In order to make sense of these observations, students look at the four fundamental interactions that govern the behaviour of the Universe: electromagnetic, strong, weak and gravitational.The last sections of the block present a history of the Universe from its origins in the cosmological Big Bang, through the present day, and into the distant future.
Evolving universe
An examination of the theory of unification of the four fundamental interactions shown in the diagram is part of the discussion on the evolving Universe.
 
A complete list of the Block 11 chapter headings is available here.

DVD-multimedia Activities

There are two DVD-multimedia activities to accompany Block 11:

 

The Virtual Telescope
Students have control of a powerful telescope with which they can measure the red-shifts and brightnesses of galaxies within several clusters. By converting the red-shifts into speeds of recession and by determining distances from the brightness measurements, they calculate the Hubble constant. This constant is a measure of the rate at which the Universe is currently expanding, which in turn gives a measure of the age of the Universe.
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Virtual telescope

A History of the Universe
In this activity students investigate the processes that have occurred in the Universe from the Big Bang to the present day. This is not a tutorial with set tasks, rather it is a resource that can be used to find out extra information on the history of the Universe, already introduced in the block text.
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