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Cosmology – the study of the Universe on its largest scale – is the most
challenging area in astronomy. It is also astronomy’s newest field dating from a
century ago. Until then, we were unaware of the extent of the Universe around us. First,
came the discovery that our Sun is part of a Galaxy of 200 billion stars, and then that
our Galaxy is just one of a hundred billion galaxies in the Universe. Next came the
finding that all the galaxies are rushing away from one another, showing that our cosmos
was once a more crowded place. Now astronomers know that the Universe began some 13
billion years ago in the Big Bang – but the future is still unknown. The biggest
unanswered question, however, concerns life elsewhere in the Universe – is
they’re anybody out there?
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