By observing the brightness of distant dying stars, astronomers have long come to believe that the expansion of the universe is accelerating. By using the inverse-square law, scientists have measured the distance to these exploded remnants, resulting in the consensus that the universe’s expansion is accelerating. However, Lee argues that this conclusion is wrong and that the brightness isn’t actually the same for each of these dying stars. The team used a sample of 300 galaxies to model the brightness of type Ia supernovae, and found that their dimming arose from “stellar astrophysics effects,” and not just distance. More on the expansion of the universe: An Important Force of the Universe Appears to Be Changing, Scientists Find