What's at the edge of the universe?

Question

Where does it end, how big is it? I'm sure no one has the answer, but it's something I've always wondered

Answer 1

the universe is not infinite, everything is made out of something just remember that!

and even if you cant see that something it does not mean its not there, for example dark matter can not bee seen with human eyes, but its there!

Oh and there is no such thing as INFINITY, because infinity is only a circle, we only are describing the same circle in different ways and numbers that's all.

But there might be electromagnetic fields at the edge of the universe or something similar to lightning.

Answer 2

The universe is a unit about 6 billion light years in radius.

  It can expand only so far at which time the density becomes less than it's ability to exist.

Answer 3

Let me put it into perspective.  The first dot, is our galaxy.  The very last one, is the closest one to us.

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And those dots, represent galaxies mind.  As to how big it is, for all we know it could be the size of a marble as described in Men in Black with Will Smith.

Answer 4

There is certainly no edge to the observable Universe. At the farthest bits of what we can see, objects red shift into oblivion due to their great speed going away from us.

The Universe may be infinte in size.  It is certainly very big.  But it could be finite in size with no edge. It could do that by gravitationally folding in on itself, or having some weird multidimensional shape, like a hypertorus.

But assuming it's flat, there may be a region where light has expanded into space, but nothing else has had a chance to get there.   There would still be the bubbling flux of the quantum foam. There could be an edge of light expanding at the speed of light.  And beyond that, just quantum foam.  Or it might be space that does not yet exist.

Answer 5

There is no edge of the universe.  This is why: the universe itself is a topogical 3-sphere in shape.  Inside this shape (which can't be perceived by people physically) if you travel in one direction constantly, you will eventually end up where you began.  This is the same in the universe, if you were to travel faster then the expansion of the universe in one direction constantly, you would curve around the universe itself and eventually end up where you started.  Mond biggling huh?

Also for your size question, you can't really state a size tot he universe.  This is why: it depends on how you look at it.  The universe has a finite amount of space inside of it, and we can predict how large it is by measuring how far light has traveled to us over time.  I mean, if the universe originated from a very small point and began expanding, it has to have a certain volume, a certain diameter, right?  But also think of this...the universe is everything.  There is nothing outside the universe, the universe is all.  This means that you can't compare the size of the universe to anything except itself, so you cannot say that it has a certain size.  The universe is not expanding into anything, it is gaining volume from inside standards, but is not from outside standards because there is no outside.  Here we can basically say that the universe is expanding into itself.  To get back to topic, people usually either say that the universe has a certain size, and as I said this cannot be comparibly pointed out, or they say that the universe is infinite, but this also cannot be said because its obvious the universe is not continuous forever from an inside view...so we really can't say anything for sure.  I actually think there is an exact nature of the form of the universe, but it is either beyond out current knowledge, our ability to understand it, or there is no way to find it out.

Answer 6

what edge? this is pretty much like asking what is at the edge of the earth. as you know, the surface of the earth doesn't have an edge but its area is nevertheless finite. the universe is probably like that, except in three (or maybe more) dimensions.

Answer 7

it's shape is so mangled you wouldn't be able to think of it as a constant shape or having a boundary

image your TV screen, if you went out to the right side you'd come out on the left side - that is how it is in our perceivable dimension (4)

Answer 8

The universe is considered to be finite but have no boundary in our 3D space. A simple model state that our space is the hypersurface  of a 4 dimensional hypersphere.

But this is just a simple model. A more detailed model will have to include six to ten dimensions.

Answer 9

I don't have an answer for you, but since you've always wondered about that, think on this: if the universe DOES have an edge, what's on the other side? And does whatever that is have an opposite edge, too? That may actually help you decide what you believe, since it's well close to impossible to prove one way or the other.

Answer 10

along side of some intelligent and wrong answers, and some intelligent and incomprehensible answers, I put this one:

We are at the edge of the universe.  We assume that nothing is special about the particular region of the universe we live in, so to some galaxy far, far away, we are at the edge of the universe.  Nothing special.

BTW, if the accelerating rate of expansion continues (dark energy) for another 50 or 70 billion years, Pluto will be at the edge of our observable universe.  We won't see the stars anymore.

Goodnight Moon.

Answer 11

it never does..its infinite..the closer you get to the "edge" the more it expands on all dimensions :o)

Answer 12

Wow, this is actually a really good question.

The edge of the universe hasn't been seen yet, to the best of my knowledge, and as such nobody can tell you.

But we can speculate that the edge of the universe is completely empty space. Or maybe it's anti-matter.

I often wonder this same thing, because when we think of how the universe was formed, it's widely accepted that it was in the form of a "big bang". The big bang, it's believed, was the product of black holes in a previously established universe. The black holes began appearing as stars died, and they began pulling everything into them, gaining mass. As the number of black holes increased, they all converged on one point, increasing their gravitational influence with each increase of mass joining one gargantuan black hole.

Until that gargantuan black hole imploded, and created the largest explosion our universe has ever seen (unless it happened before).

The edge of the universe is riding the blast wave from that explosion - but what is on the other side?

Does gravitational force from a supermassive black hole have the ability to draw in anti-matter?

That's an excellent question, and I'm inclined to say that I believe the edge of the universe is simply empty space, stretching perpetually off into oblivion.  Sort of what I think I would define as h**l.

Edit for additional information:

Many of the responses on here are assuming that the net acceleration of stellar bodies on the edge of the universe is 0. This cannot be the case, because even space is not a vacuum, and the laws of physics do apply to even the largest bodies of mass. The idea that the acceleration of the universe is so great that it would wrap around itself is flawed for the simple fact that it assumes that the universe has finite dimensions which have a threshold, which, if crossed, will put you onto the other side of the universe. Highly improbable.

It is true, however, that, due to the doppler effect, stellar bodies far out in the universe's extent are turning red as they fly away from us, but the important thing to remember is that speed is proportional to our own as a galaxy or larger gravitational matrix.

There are also the arguments that we are on the edge of the universe, because the universe is proportional to your location. There is some merit in that argument, but one has to really think about it - how can we be on the edge of the universe if stellar bodies are moving away from us and they can be seen in every direction from us?

This question cannot be answered in many aspects, because we, as a species, exist and perceive in three dimensions (four if you count time as Einstein did), when we know that there are numerous other dimensions. We cannot definitively say what is in our realm of the universe, let alone on the fringes of our universal existence.

Answer 13

Astronomical observations indicate that the universe is 13.73 ± 0.12 billion years old and at least 93 billion light years across. At this point in time all matter and energy of the observable universe was concentrated in one point of infinite density.

Meaning the universe has no edge at all.