• Question: If -273 degrees celsius is the lowest possible temperature, what is the highest possible temperature?

    Asked by Jamie W. on 26 Nov 2020.
    • Photo: Duncan Wallace

      Duncan Wallace answered on 26 Nov 2020:

      I am open to correction on this but I don’t think there is a theoretical limit. It gets progressively more challenging for higher temperatures to be reached, with the energy relating to extremely high temperatures typically observed in an environment where gravity stops an immediate dissipation of this heat and energy (for instance the gravity of our sun stops it being torn apart by its own energy). Intuitively I would assume that Black Holes are the hottest thing in the universe, but at that stage gravity has become so overwhelming that it can radiate almost none of that heat (with the practical exception of quasars of course).

    • Photo: Danny Hnatyshin

      Danny Hnatyshin answered on 27 Nov 2020:

      So you can get high temperatures by giving particles more energy. In gases for example you can do this by packing in more atoms into a smaller volume (Ideal gas law). Now you take this to the extreme by packing everything in the universe into a tiny volume, that would be the highest possible temperature, and it is what it was at the big bang (this is actually called the plank temperature and is about 140000000000000000000000000000000 degrees C!

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