Word: supernovae
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...Levy, the celebrated amateur who has discovered or co-discovered 21 comets, including the famous Shoemaker-Levy, which crashed into Jupiter in 1994. While there are only so many planets or visible comets out there, amateurs are making contributions tracking star movements and lunar cycles and even hunting for supernovas. Larry Mitchell, the Houstonian with the 36-in. telescope, spotted his own supernova in 1994, a find that in turn enabled professional astronomers to measure the distance to that exploding star's home galaxy. "The professionals need that data and don't have the time to do it," says LAAS...
...a.k.a. the "little professor" or "geek" syndrome, tend to sound like CDs on autoplay. "Did you ask her if she's interested in astrophysics?" a mother gently chides her son, who has launched into an excruciatingly detailed description of what goes on when a star explodes into a supernova...
Rather than try to scoop each other, the friendly rivals decided to cooperate--and soon realized they had stumbled onto something truly astonishing. The new supernova, some 50% closer to the beginning of the universe than any supernova known before, was far brighter than had been predicted. That neatly eliminated the idea of dust, since a more distant star should have been even more dust-dimmed than nearer ones. But the level of brightness also signaled that this supernova was shining when the expansion of the cosmos was still slowing down. "Usually," says Riess, "we see weird things...
...could have been flattened purely by matter--but the new discoveries prove that ordinary matter and exotic particles add up to only about 35% of what you would need. Ergo, the extra curvature must come from some unseen energy--just about the amount, it turns out, suggested by the supernova observations. "I was highly dubious about dark energy based only on supernovas," says Princeton astrophysicist Edwin Turner (no relation to Michael, though the two often refer to each other as "my evil twin"). "This makes me take dark energy more seriously...
...case, new tests of these bizarre ideas will not be too long in coming. Next week a satellite will launch from Cape Canaveral to make the most sensitive observations ever of the cosmic background radiation. Supernova watchers, meanwhile, are lobbying NASA for a dedicated telescope so they won't have to queue up for time on the badly oversubscribed Hubble. And lower-tech telescopes and microwave detectors, both on the ground and lofted into the air aboard balloons, will continue to refine their measurements...