"A Living History of the Universe" May 14, 2010

Every minute of every day light from the remote past arrives at Earth,much of it originating before the Earth itself was born. Astronomers are uniquely privileged to have a look at history as it actually happened, but in practice gathering enough light from distant galaxies to learn something about them is not at all easy. Drawing connections from what we see in a younger universe to the one of our own time is also very challenging. A small history of this endeavor teaches us something about how science works and the persistence of human curiosity.