Imprimir Republish

Astronomy

Hubble constant recalculated

ESA/HUBLE/NASA/SUYUY ET AL Variations in the distance between quasars over time were used to calculate a new value for the Hubble constantESA/HUBLE/NASA/SUYUY ET AL

There is a new value for the Hubble constant, the number that estimates the rate at which the universe is expanding. An international collaboration led by Sherry Suyu, astronomer with the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, in Germany, used two telescopes in space and seven on the ground to measure changes over time in the distances between the Solar System and quasars (very bright galactic nuclei). Based on these data, soon to be published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, researchers estimate the value of the Hubble constant at 71.9 kilometers per second per million parsecs, or Megaparsecs (1 parsec corresponds to 3.26 light years). In 2016, the figure had been set at 73.2 kilometers per second per Megaparsec, based on variations in star distances. The two values are quite similar, with the latest only 1.8% lower than the previous, and they indicate that the Cosmos has been expanding faster in recent times than in the more distant past.

Republish