Word: alpher
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...respectable model of the universe must explain successfully this relative abundance of the elements. One theory, the "evolving universe" (held by George Gamow and Ralph Alpher), presumes that about 5 billion years ago the universe started life with the great-great-grandfather of all explosions. The universe was then small, dense and hot, and was made up entirely of radiation and neutrons. As it exploded and expanded, most of the neutrons split into protons and electrons (hydrogen). A few joined together to form the heavier elements. It was all over in about 15 minutes; since then, the abundance of heavier...
...RALPH A. ALPHER AND R. C. HERMAN The Johns Hopkins University Silver Spring...
...universe. It is simply an illusion that may be viewed by anyone driving along a highway . . . when objects . . . seem to be moving in different directions at varying speeds. I am more confirmed in my theory than ever after reading "What [the two cosmologists of the Gamow school, Drs. Ralph Alpher and Robert Herman] find harder to explain is why the earth should happen to be at the exact center of the great expansion...
TIME erred in implying that Cosmologists Alpher and Herman did say so. All the distant galaxies appear to be receding from the earth. This is hard to explain on the basis of one central explosion, unless the earth should happen to be at the point from which the galaxies are receding. No cosmologist, of course, believes that this is the case. A better explanation is that space itself is expanding, making each galaxy move away from the others...
...beta-decay" made the nuclei more stable -able to capture more neutrons. Bigger & bigger they grew, until all the elements in the universe had been formed. Then this growing process stopped; there were no more free neutrons, and the gas had become too cool to support nuclear reactions. Drs. Alpher & Herman believe that all the elements were formed in less than an hour after the great event...