According to one existing theory, the Big Bang happened 13.8 billion years ago, and the most distant objects of space cannot be older than 13.8 billion years. It may seem that beyond this distance, we cannot observe anything, but the size of the observed universe is much larger and amounts to 93 billion light-years, that is, space is much larger than its age. How did it happen?
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If the Universe was filled only with radiation at all times, the objects whose light had finally reached us after traveling for 13.8 billion years would now be 27.6 billion light-years away from us. That means the radiation diameter of the universe is 27.6 billion years, which brings us closer to the value of 93 billion light-years of the “observable” Universe, which is often mentioned.
Each yellow and red of the regions in the relict radiation image presented below, to date, that is, over 13.8 billion years have become a supercluster of galaxies.
However, due to the continued expansion of the Universe, these superclusters are probably already at a distance of 46.5 billion light-years from us.
The light from these clusters started its journey to us only now, and of course, it will take time to come from the surface of a sphere with a diameter of 93 billion years to our planet, which is in its center.
But the problem is that because of the dark energy, the Universe expands with acceleration, which lasted at least 3 billion years.
As a result of this acceleration, superclusters located at a distance of 46.5 billion light-years from us will move away another 32.7 billion years, starting from the assumed moment of their observation on our planet.
Thus, a diameter of 93 billion years is the largest, theoretical estimate of the current stretch of all matter that we can see, even taking into account that the age of visible light is 13.8 billion years.
