Maxwell Moe, astrophysicist, NASA Einstein Fellow, University of Arizona via Brian Keating, Jonas Mureika and  Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)

“Eliminating the singularity or Big Bang– which has its origins in the late 1920s when US astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered that almost all galaxies are moving away from each other at ever-faster velocities– brings back the bouncing Universe on to the theoretical stage of cosmology. The absence of a singularity at the start of spacetime opens up the possibility that vestiges of a previous contraction phase may have withstood the phase change (between contraction to expansion) and may still be with us in the ongoing expansion of the Universe,” said Brazilian physicist Juliano Cesar Silva Neves.

A Universe Prior to the Big Bang

Although for five decades, the Big Bang theory has been the best known and most accepted explanation for the beginning and evolution of the Universe, it is hardly a consensus among scientists. Physicists are now assuming the possibility of vestiges of a Universe previous to the Big Bang.

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