Supernova Cosmology Project

The Supernova Cosmology Project (SCP) was a project begun in the 1990s to determine the history of the Hubble parameter, in effect, the cosmological constant and its history, whether the universe's expansion is accelerating or decelerating. Its strategy was to collect data on the frequency of Type Ia supernovae against redshift, producing a kind of Hubble diagram. The supernova search was carried out with the Blanco 4m telescope, with follow-up spectroscopy and photometry on other telescopes, to record light curves. The project concluded the expansion is accelerating, and this conclusion gave rise to the term dark energy, for whatever is making that happen.