Big Bang scientists say universe 80m years older

SCIENTISTS have hailed the uncovering of “fundamental truths” as new evidence has shown that the universe is 80 million years older than first thought.

The findings, made using satellite mapping generated by the European Space Agency’s Planck space probe, sought to investigate the theory of inflation relating to the Big Bang, which says the universe burst from subatomic size to its now-observable expanse in a fraction of a second.

“We’ve uncovered a fundamental truth of the universe,” said George Efstathiou, director of the Kavli Institute for Cosmology at the University of Cambridge, who announced the results in Paris. “There’s less stuff that we don’t understand by a tiny amount.”

“It’s a big pat on the back for our understanding of the universe,” California Institute of Technology physicist Sean Carroll, who was not involved in the project, said.

“In terms of describing the current universe, I think we have a right to say we’re on the right track.”

The Big Bang - the most comprehensive theory of the universe’s beginning - says the visible portion of the universe was smaller than an atom when, in a split second, it exploded, cooled and expanded faster than the speed of light.