Orbital Web: Why the Big Rip Will Wait at Least 30 Years ✦
Original: "Apocalypse When? Solar System Constraints on an Imminent Big Rip"
Even if dark energy suddenly turns phantom, planetary motion data ensures that the universe's demise is at least 30 years away.
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Even if dark energy decides to stage a Big Rip, the planets will warn us 30 years in advance. Their orbits are like a taut web: the slightest change in tension is an alarm. Lasers and radio beams continuously probe that web, and for now, it remains still. Thus we've turned the Solar System into the first cosmic weather sensor.
🎯 Though 30 years is an instant for the universe, it means that if the phantom transition had started in 753 BC, Saturn's orbit would only be deviating now.
w = \frac{p}{\rho}
Equation-of-state parameter for dark energy: w is the ratio of pressure to density. If w < –1, energy density grows over time, triggering the Big Rip.
t_{\text{rip}} - t_0 = \frac{1}{|1+w|\sqrt{6\pi G \rho_0}}
Characteristic time until the Big Rip for constant w. The closer w is to –1 or the lower the density, the farther off the catastrophe.
Scientists
Alan GuthAndrei LindeGeorges LemaîtreJames PeeblesAdam RiessBrian Schmidtdark energy
expansion of the universe
gravity
Hubble Space Telescope
redshift
cosmic microwave background
supernova
Standard Model
big bangLaws
Friedmann equationsHubble's lawNoether's theoremEinstein field equationsPlanck's lawspin–statistics theorem