If I have a super large telescope, would I be looking towards the beginning of the universe no matter which direction I point it?

Question

I read that the Hubble telescope could look 13.2 billion years back in time – what would it see if it turned 180 degrees and looked the other way?

In: Other

Answer 1

Yes. You would be. However, you will not be able to see it because of doppler effect. As universe has been expanding at very fast rate, the light that was emitted during big bang has also stretched out. The stretching of light means increasing wavelength in the micrometer range. So the light would be a Microwave.

Since at the beginning the universe was completely concentrated at a single location with very high density, and it expanded in all directions, we see uniform image across all directions.

Sine the waves will be MICROWAVE, distributed uniformly EVERYWHERE throught the COSMOS it is called Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB).

So besides being large, the telescope will also need to be able to detect microwaves.