The microwave background

Microwave dishes

The microwave background is detected as a persistent faint hiss on all microwave communications, everywhere. It appears as 'snow' on a television set that is on but not tuned to a broadcast signal. The background was first detected by telephone engineers who tried everything they could think of to eliminate it. The microwave background is black body radiation at a temperature of about 3 K and is almost uniform throughout space. It is currently believed to be a remnant of the so called 'big bang'.

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