USA Today: ‘How did we get here?’ NASA hopes ‘artificial star’ can teach us more about the universe

In a $19.5 million NASA-funded mission, researchers at George Mason University are heading a project to construct and eventually launch a small satellite into space.

• Once in orbit, the so-called “artificial star” will be far enough away to look like a star to telescopes back on Earth.
• The satellite will then begin the work of helping researchers study star brightness to gain more precise estimates of their size, scale and age.
• By doing so, the researchers hope to uncover fresh clues about how fast the universe is expanding and, just maybe, whether life could exist anywhere else in the universe.

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