Hi everyone, producer Susie here. We greatly appreciate your support listening to astronomy

cast. And we'd like to ask another small favor you can do to support our work. Just go

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Astronomy cast Episode 541. Weird issues. The expansion rate of the universe. Welcome to Astronomy

cast where we can fix based journey through the cosmos where we help you understand not

only what we know but how we know what we know. I'm Fraser Kane, publisher of Universe

today with me as always, Dr. Pamela Gay, a senior scientist for the Planetary Science Institute

and the Director of CosmoQuest. Pamela, how are you doing? I'm doing well. I'm actually

at the Planetary Science Institute this week and it has been an amazing adventure but it

also means the audio is going to sound a little bit more hollow today because I got to

borrow a friend's corner office and it is awesome but a little hollow sounding. Not as

soundproofed as the home office that you normally recorded. No, yeah, it's true. Yep.

This one the universe was starting to make sense. The cosmos throws a curve ball at us.

Astronomers have been trying to accurately measure the expansion rate of the universe as far

back as Hubble. It's been tough to nail down and now astronomers are starting to figure

out why.

Pamela, why is the expansion rate of the universe important to know?

It's one of those things that really defines what is the likelihood that different blobs

of matter are going to have a chance to come together. It is the thing that defined what

was the density of material when stars were ready to form. It is the thing that will eventually

...