expanding universe

expanding universe, dynamic state of the extragalactic realm, the discovery of which transformed 20th-century cosmology. The development of general relativity and its application to cosmology by German-born physicist Albert Einstein, Dutch mathematician Willem de Sitter, and other theoreticians, along with the detection of extragalactic redshift (a shift to the longer wavelengths of light from galaxies beyond the Milky Way) by American astronomer Vesto Slipher, led to the realization in the 1920s that all galaxies are receding. American astronomer Edwin Hubble correlated these observations in mathematical form to provide evidence that the universe is expanding. The discovery of the 2.7 K cosmic microwave background radiation in 1965 by American physicists Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson was convincing evidence that the universe originated 13.8 billion years ago from a very dense and hot state in the big bang.

For much of the 20th century, it was an open question whether the universe is open (of infinite extent in space) or closed (of finite extent) and whether the universe in the future will continue to expand indefinitely or will eventually collapse back into an extremely dense congested state. The mass in galaxies observed directly, when averaged over cosmological distances, is estimated to be only a few percent of the amount required to close the universe. However, the dark matter that has been deduced from various dynamic arguments is about 23 percent of the universe, and dark energy supplies the remaining amount, bringing the total average mass density up to 100 percent of the closure density.