Cosmos at full throttle

[GoBlue]

A baffling force called dark energy is causing the universe to expand at a faster rate than previously thought.

Will the universe eventually collapse in the "big crunch," expand forever in the "big loneliness," or be torn to bits in the "big rip"?

The key to answering those questions appears to lie in a mysterious form of energy that has been cracking the cosmic whip on the universe for the past 6 billion to 7 billion years. This "dark energy" appears to be causing the universe to grow at an accelerated rate rather than a rate scientists previously thought would slow forever. Six years after astronomers first stunned the scientific world with this discovery, researchers say dark energy still baffles them. Yet several studies reported over the past year have strengthened the evidence for dark energy's role as cosmic gas pedal, researchers say.

The results "point to the promise of improving our understanding of dark energy," says Michael Turner, head of the astronomy and astrophysics department at the University of Chicago. That understanding, he says, is critical to answering fundamental questions about the origin and future of the universe and the nature of matter and space-time.




more at ...

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0527/p13s02-stss.html

[shoopnyc123]

1. It's always darkest...

before the dawn...