What would be your estimate of the age of the universe if you measured a value for hubble's constant of h0 = 30 km/s/mly? you can assume that the expansion rate has remained unchanged during the history of the universe. express your answer using two significant figures. yr?

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Physics

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27 February, 22:51

What would be your estimate of the age of the universe if you measured a value for hubble's constant of h0 = 30 km/s/mly? you can assume that the expansion rate has remained unchanged during the history of the universe. express your answer using two significant figures. yr?

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Fly · Answer 1

First, let's define the units of the Hubble's constant. It is kilometers per second per million light year. Light year is the length of time for the light to travel. Hence, we can use the light year to find the distance travelled by using the speed of light which is equal to 300,000,000 m/s or 300,000 km/s. 1 million light year is equal to 1.314 x 10^12 seconds.

d = s/t = 300,000 km/s : 1.314 x 10^12 s = 3.942 x 10^17 km

Through dimensional analysis:

(3.942 x 10^17 km / 1 MLY) * (1/30km/s/MLY) = 1.314x 10^16 seconds = 10 billion years