ΛCDM Model of CosmologyImage Credit: NASA/ LAMBDA Archive / WMAP Science Team We illustrate a brief and simplified picture of theorized stages in the evolution of the universe, to provide a context for discussing ΛCDM parameters. In this picture, the infant universe is an extremely hot, dense, nearly homogeneous mixture of photons and matter, tightly coupled together as a plasma. An approximate graphical timeline of its theoretical evolution is shown in the figure above, with numbers keyed to the explanatory text below.
Contributed by the NASA / LAMBDA Archive Team. |