Scientists Announce Most Accurate Measurements Between Galaxies In History

Scientists are prepared today to present their findings from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-III) and have announced that the survey has allowed the most accurate measurements ever of the distances between galaxies in the faraway universe. These measurements allowed the scientists to get a look at billions and billions of years ago when the universe first began to expand at an increasing rate. Six related papers will be presented today.

The results of the six different papers will be presented in Manchester, England at the National Astronomy Meeting. The scientists have been trying to discover what is making our universe expand at an ever-increasing pace. Scientists believe the most likely reason is dark energy. However, another theory, believed to be less likely, is that a very large distances the force of gravity deviates from Einstein's prediction in his General Theory of Relativity becoming repulsive.

The results of the six papers will be presented today, after two years work by teams of scientists and engineers working with the Baryon Oscilliation Spectrascopic Survey (BOSS). BOSS has produced the most detailed map of the universe ever made according to the scientists. BOSS measures the spectra of more than 1 million galaxies over six years, and some of the galaxies observed are so far from our planet that it took the light more than 6 billion years to reach us. The scientific work is exceptionally detailed and complicated, but the image here is easy enough to understand. It's amazing how far apart the galaxies have moved in the billions of years between individual snapshots.

[via Red Orbit]