EXPANDING COSMOS

Hubble images provide confirmation: Universe grows faster than we thought

The story written in the light of exploding white dwarf stars already has thrown modern cosmology into tumult. It is the history of the universe, and by the time scientists finish reading it, they're likely to come to a new understanding of gravity, particle physics and a mysterious energy comprising three-fourths of the cosmos.
The Astrophysical Journal, Lawrence Berkeley lab's Saul Perlmutter and colleagues report new confirmation from the Hubble Space Telescope of the 1998 discovery that the universe is, in fact, expanding faster and faster every second.
Suddenly, the universe became a strange and unknowable place, where ordinary matter -- the stuff of stars, planets and people -- is less than 5 percent of the total. Another 20 percent or so is an unseen substance, dark matter, that contorted the birth and distribution of galaxies. The last 75 percent is "dark energy," a repulsive energy pushing more and more space between stars and galaxies.