This suitcase-sized spacecraft could hear the universe before stars existed

What happened

The project has received funding from the UK Space Agency, and researchers hope CosmoCube can launch within the next five years. Developed in the UK, the spacecraft is called CosmoCube.

An international research team led by the University of Cambridge plans to send it around the Moon, where the lunar far side can block radio interference coming from Earth. Listening for a Signal From Before the First Stars Scientists call this signal the 21 centimeter line.

It comes from hydrogen atoms that existed during the period between the lingering afterglow of the Big Bang and Cosmic Dawn, when nuclear fusion switched on inside the first stars. No one has directly observed this chapter of cosmic history.

Over the spacecraft's expected two-year mission, researchers hope to collect about 1000 hours of observations from one of the final largely unexplored eras in the universe. Searching for Dark Matter's Early Influence CosmoCube is designed to investigate more than the time before the first stars.