Macroverse

There was no matter. All that existed was space/time and energy. An ocean of energy, almost still but gently rippling. A near still ocean of energy filling the void.

Less than a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang, the energy transformed into tiny particles and radiation. These particles formed a very dense and hot 'soup" of quarks, gluons, electronics, neutrinos and other particles – these are the tiniest known building blocks of everything in the universe.

Hydrogen and helium poured into the regions where the filaments crossed, gathering into ever-denser clouds. Gravity asserted its grip and the clouds of gas began to collapse, becoming denser and denser. In the densest regions the gas became so hot that nuclear fusion reactions began. Hundreds of times as massive as our sun, they shone with such ferocity that they shone blue. With surface temperatures in excess of 100,000 degrees, they were the largest stars ever to have lived.

Over time these elements gathered together, creating rich clouds of gas and dust, nurseries where new generations of stars were born. And not just stars, but families of stars, the first galaxies. And around this time some of the earlier star systems formed in our own galaxy, the Milky Way. A new age of complexity was dawning in the universe. And crucially, new bodies had appeared, planets. Places where the rich chemical elements built by previous generations of stars could finally find a home.

The universe abounds in complexity, from everyday systems such as turbulent streams and snowflakes to grand cosmic structures like nebulae and spiral galaxies. However, one class of complex systems – life – stands out as especially remarkable… Schrödinger identified life's ability to buck the trend of the second law of thermodynamics as a defining quality. Living organisms achieve this entropy-defying feat by garnering and processing information and directing it into purposeful activity. By coupling patterns of information to patterns of chemical reactions… life conjures coherence and organisation from molecular chaos.

We are living in the age of stars, an era of light and life in the cosmos. From our fleeting human perspective, stars seem eternal.