People’s concepts of what constitutes the universe have changed drastically over the ages. At the first the earth was put at the centre of the universe. Then the earth was found to be just a planet and thought sun as the centre. Soon sun was found to an ordinary star, which was the part of the galaxy, and man began to think galaxy was the universe. Now scientists believe that there are many galaxies and cluster of many galaxies make our universe.
Continuing this trend of astronomical upsizing, the latest speculation among astronomers is that may be the universe we know is only one of the many and that there may be many universes making a vast super universe.
The universe was called COSMOS as opposed to chaos, when it was first thought of an orderly unit, and the study relating to the COSMOS were known as cosmology.
The difference between space and outer space is that space means the whole universe including the earth while outer space means all space other than earth, in fact the outer space begins where the earth’s atmosphere ends and extends on and on in all directions outer space is vast our terrestrial unit of measurement hardly suits its dimensions so we have evolved new unit of measurement like the light year and the Astronomical Unit a light year is the distance covered by light in one year in vacuums travelling at a speed of 299,792.5 km per speed.
The solar system is less than one light day (the distance light travels in one day) after the International Space Station (ISS)is completed NASA will take up the challenge of exploration beyond low earth orbit- to the moon, to mars and the solar system taking a step further NASA is expected to test the new crew exploration vehicle (CEV), now its rechristened Ares 1 NASA will conduct its first manned mission by 2014.Ares 1 will also transport astronauts and scientists to ISS after the shuttle fleet is retired .
Ever since Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldine became the world’s first two human beings to land on the moon in July 1969, NASA followed it up by sending ten more astronauts to moon, however for more than three decades now, no human being has visited the moon NASA aims to use Ares 1 for returning astronauts to the moon by 2020 and use (CEV) as a stepping stone for sending human beings to mars and beyond.
