Hubble's law

American  

noun

Astronomy.

1. the law that the velocity of recession of distant galaxies from our own is proportional to their distance from us.

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Hubble's law British  

noun

1. astronomy a law stating that the velocity of recession of a galaxy is proportional to its distance from the observer

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Hubble's law Scientific  

/ hŭb′əlz /

1. A law of cosmology stating that the rate at which astronomical objects in the universe move apart from each other is proportional to their distance from each other. Current estimates of the value of this proportion, known as Hubble's constant, put its value at approximately 71 kilometers per second per megaparsec.

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Etymology

Origin of Hubble's law

First recorded in 1930–35; named after E. P. Hubble, discoverer of the relationship

Example Sentences

Pythagoras wasn’t the first person to derive the Pythagorean theorem, Edwin Hubble wasn’t the first to formulate Hubble’s law, and so on.

From Scientific American

Hubble’s law says the recession velocity of a galaxy is equal to its distance multiplied by a quantity called Hubble’s constant.

From Scientific American

To test Hubble’s law, astronomers need to measure distances to galaxies.

From Scientific American

If the theory is correct, everything in the visible universe should be younger than the expansion time computed from Hubble’s law.

From Scientific American

This relation, now known as Hubble’s law, is just what one would expect in a uniformly expanding universe.

From Scientific American