Search for our Cosmic Origins

New measurements of the acceleration of the universe, precise measurements of the light from the moment the universe became transparent, and mapping of the distribution of matter on cosmic scales have revolutionized the search for our cosmic origins. This new information has led to a model of the universe in which 95% of the mass/energy in the universe exists as dark matter and dark energy, neither of which has ever been directly measured in a laboratory, only inferred from astronomical observations. Professor James Green will outline the observational case for the current cosmological paradigm, placing it in the context of Einstein’s theory of general relativity and will detail the development of the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS). COS was the last instrument installed in the Hubble space telescope during the final servicing mission in 2009 and was developed and built in Boulder by CU and Ball Aerospace.