The 1998–2003 Revolution
The 1998–2003 Revolution
This chapter looks at the change in the state of empirical cosmology in the five years from 1998 to 2003, which was great enough to be termed a revolution. It was driven by the two great experimental advances. The first is the measurement of the relation between the redshift of the spectrum of an object and its brightness in the sky, given its luminosity: the cosmological redshift–magnitude relation. The second is the detailed mapping of the angular distribution of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. The two programs reached the precision needed for significant constraints on cosmological models at essentially the same time. Quick acceptance of their interpretation was driven by the impressive consistency of implications of these two quite different ways to look at the universe and, equally important, by the consistency with other lines of evidence gathered in the years of research before the revolution.
Keywords: empirical cosmology, redshift–magnitude relation, cosmic microwave background radiation, cosmological models, universe
Princeton Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.