The Year of Distant Supernovae

Explanation: Distant supernovae were among topics at the forefront of astronomy during 1998. Two independent groups raced to deploy large telescopes to scan the sky, discovering and analyzing far-off supernovae with the promise of calibrating the geometry of our universe . The results were surprising -- implying an unexpected universe rich in not only dark matter ( Omega in matter ~ 0.3) but also in dark energy ( Lambda ~ 0.7). Skeptics remain cautious , however, some waiting for more than a few high- redshift supernovae to light the way, while others waiting for verification methods not vulnerable to the same types of systematic errors . Pictured above are several of the distant supernovae that have ignited modern cosmology .