Next challenges

Abstract

Previous chapters have offered a view of the status of several lines of research of interest for current cosmology, covering observational aspects and their theoretical interpretation(s) and focusing on the wealth of information they provide for our comprehension of the properties of the Universe. It is remarkable that, in spite of the huge and high quality developments achieved during the last decades, many important questions linked to both fundamental physics and cosmology are still open. As often occurs in science and as pointed out in the contributions of previous chapters, recent achievements and discoveries give satisfactory answers to some problems, but, at the same time, pose new crucial questions which have deep implications for our view of the cosmos. © 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.