Overview

How did the Universe form? What are the fundamental forces and structures? Why are there galaxies, stars and planets? What led to the formation of the chemical elements? What does the future hold for the cosmos?

These profound questions accurately portray the themes scientists have to deal with when studying the Universe. To this day, scientists have not yet found a satisfactory explanation of how the cosmic building blocks of matter, space and time, as well as the basic forces, have developed. Also, the question is still open as to why the (nowadays generally accepted) standard model of physics cannot explain a number of phenomena of modern particle and astrophysics. For this reason, physicists have designed theoretical models such as supersymmetry (SUSY) and string theory.

The Cluster of Excellence "Origin and Structure of the Universe" was founded in October 2006 within the framework of the Excellence Initiative of the Federation of German Federal States as a joint institution of the two Munich universities Technische Universität München (TUM) and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU) and was located at TUM. Together with important partners (Max-Planck Institutes for Physics, Astrophysics and Extraterrestrial Physics, European Southern Observatory (ESO), University Observatory Munich), the various steps in the evolution of the Universe from the Big Bang to the development of stellar objects were studied, bringing the various fields of research - nuclear, particle, astrophysics and cosmology - closer together. The UNIVERSE Cluster ended after a second funding period on December 31, 2018. The numerous resulting interdisciplinary collaborations have led to the development of a new concept, which thematically includes the origin of first prebiotic life and focuses on the most interdisciplinary of the research questions. Many structures from the UNIVERSE Cluster were taken over or expanded. New infrastructure has been implemented. Since 1.1.2019 the ORIGINS Cluster has succeeded UNIVERSE.