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00:00The Nobel Prize in Physics 2011 was divided, one half awarded to Saul Perlmutter, the other
00:21half jointly to Brian P. Schmidt and Adam G. Reese for his discovery of the accelerating
00:28expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernova.
00:34The Universe's stars and galaxies are moving away from one another.
00:39The Universe is expanding.
00:42Up until recently, the majority of astrophysicists believed that this expansion would eventually
00:48wane due to the effect of opposing gravitational forces.
00:54Saul Perlmutter, Brian Schmidt and Adam Rees studied exploding stars, called supernova.
01:03Because the light emitted by stars appears weaker from a large distance and takes on a reddish
01:09hue as it moves further from the observer, the researchers were able to determine how
01:15the supernova moved.
01:18In 1998, they reached a surprising result.
01:22The Universe is expanding at a never-increasing rate.
01:27Saul Perlmutter grew up outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
01:31His parents were professors of chemical and biomolecular engineering and social work administration
01:37respectively.
01:40After studying at Harvard University, Perlmutter received his PhD from the University of California.
01:47He conducted his Nobel Prize-awarded research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
01:53Saul Perlmutter is a co-founder of the Supernova Cosmology Project and a professor of physics
02:00at the University of California, Berkeley.
02:03Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice.
02:08What will be the final destiny of the Universe?
02:11Probably it will end in ice, if we are to believe this year's Nobel laureates in physics.
02:17They have studied several dozen exploding stars, called supernova, and discovered that the
02:23Universe is expanding at an ever-accelerating rate.
02:28The discovery came as a complete surprise even to the laureates themselves.
02:32In 1998, Cosmology was shaken at its foundations as two research teams presented their findings.
02:41Headed by Saul Perlmutter, one of the teams had set to work in 1988.
02:48Brian Schmidt headed another team, launched at the end of 1994, where Adam Rees was to play
02:54a crucial role.
02:55The research teams raced to map the Universe by locating the most distant supernova.
03:03More sophisticated telescopes on the ground and in space, as well as more powerful computers,
03:08and new digital imaging sensors opened the possibility in the 1990s to add more pieces to the cosmological
03:18puzzle.
03:19The teams used a particular kind of supernova, called type YAR supernova.
03:24It is an explosion of an old compact star that is as heavy as the Sun, but as small as the Earth.
03:30A single such supernova can emit as much light as a whole galaxy.
03:37All in all, the two research teams found over 50 distant supernovae whose light was weaker
03:42than expected.
03:44This was a sign that the expansion of the Universe was accelerating.
03:49The potential pitfalls had been numerous, and the scientists found reassurance in the fact
03:54that both groups had reached the same astonishing conclusion.
03:59For almost a century, the Universe has been known to be expanding as a consequence of the
04:04Big Bang about 14 billion years ago.
04:08However, the discovery that this expansion is accelerating is astounding.
04:13If the expansion will continue to speed up, the Universe will end in ice.
04:20The acceleration is thought to be driven by dark energy, but what that dark energy is remains
04:27an enigma.
04:28Perhaps the greatest in physics today.
04:31What is known is that dark energy constitutes about three quarters of the Universe.
04:37Therefore, the findings of the 2011 Nobel Laureates in Physics have helped to unveil a Universe
04:45that to a large extent is unknown to science.
04:49And everything is possible again.
04:58You
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