Lecture 38: The First Three Minutes

What was the Universe like from the earliest phases immediately after the Big Bang to the present day? This lecture reviews the physics of matter, and follows the evolution of the expanding Universe from the first instants after the Big Bang, when all 4 forces of nature were unified in a single grand-unified superforce until the emergence of the visible Universe we see around us today. Recorded 2006 March 1 in 1008 Evans Laboratory on the Columbus campus of The Ohio State University.