In search of an answer, A WINDOW TO CREATION follows the scientists eho are attempting to sort through the remnants of the big bang, for evidence which still lingers after 15 billion years.
Like mythical "time travelers", Paul Richards and Andrew Lange from the University of California at Berkely are finding that evidence through unique experiments. Their odyssey takes us to Japan, to launch a rocket above the earth's atmosphere.
In this dramatic profile of astronomers at work, we see how the researchers overcome difficulties from technical glitches to typhoons, aswell as competetion from other scientists. For halfway across the world, we watch NASA scientist John Mather prepare to launch the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite, to achieve an identical goal.
At the same to time, new pieces of the puzzle fall into place through the findings of Cambridge scientists Margaret Geller and John Huchra. By mapping the univer beyond the Milky Way, the pair discoverd unexpected structures like a "Great Wall" of galaxies more than 500 million light years long.
The thrill of being in a pioneering field like astronomy is well captured in A WINDOW TO CREATION, especially in the words of Andrew Lange:
""I get a big kick out of the fact that we build a machine that can see the light coming from the beginning of the univer. That's a lot of fun. You look at the sky and wonder where the atoms we 're made of came from. Every culture has had their answer to the question: how did things start...and where are they going?