Attachment 4759

ODD ALIGNMENTS hide within the multipoles of the cosmic microwave background.
In this combination of the quadrupole and octopole, a plane bisects the sphere between
the largest warm and cool lobes. The ecliptic — the plane of Earth’s orbit projected onto
the celestial sphere — is aligned parallel to the plane between the lobes. In addition, the
Sun’s direction of motion through the universe is only 10° from lying in the same plane.
Astronomy: Roen Kelly; multipole map: Dragan Huterer



Ecliptic oddities

Armed with multipole vectors, and joined by Dominik J.Schwarz of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), we have discovered unexpected patterns in the CMB. Not only are the quadrupole and octopole planar, but their planes are nearly perpendicular to the ecliptic. Moreover, we found that the ecliptic plane lies precisely between the warmest and coolest lobes of the combined quadrupole plus octopole map.

The likelihood of these alignments happening by chance is less than 0.1 percent.
Finally, the quadrupole and octopole planes are also perpendicular with the CMB dipole, which points to the direction of motion of the solar system. Why CMB patterns are oriented to the solar system is not at all understood at this time...