What has Hubble helped to reveal about the expansion of the universe?
One of the primary goals for the Hubble space telescope when it was launched
was to refine the measurement of the rate of the expansion of the universe.
And Hubble has done that marvelously for us.
But a surprise came a few years ago, scientists using Hubble and also telescopes on the ground
realized that the expansion rate of the universe is actually getting faster.
And as we look at very distant galaxies using these sensitive instruments we can tell that the
universe expansion has not always been uniform.
Toward the beginning of our universe's expansion it was decelerating now it's accelerating.
So Hubble is now being used to refine even further that expansion rate of the universe,
and trying to compare that to what might be predicted, from looking at other measurements of the universe
with other telescopes.
Right now we're finding a discrepancy between what we might have expected and what we're actually measuring.
So that's one realm where Hubble is really at the cutting edge of helping us understand
or at least open up new mysteries of the universe.
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