"First Light" Wins Nobel
In the 1993 edition of Cosmic Times, we featured articles on the results of the COBE mission, which produced a spectrum and mapped the cosmic microwave background (CMB). By measuring the CMB so accurately, they proved that cosmology could be a precise science, allowing scientists to test predictions of different theories of the origin of our Universe.
This article in the 2006 Cosmic Times updates the COBE story with the announcement of the awarding of the Nobel Prize for Physics to the COBE mission scientists. This honored the achievements of COBE and its contributions to the field of cosmology. The fact that this appears in the same edition as the WMAP results shows the continuity of science, and how one accomplishment builds on earlier ones.
For more information on the discoveries of COBE, please see the 1993 edition of Cosmic Times.
Other resources
The following web page has more detailed information: