Le 28/03/2017 =E0 19:47, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) a =E9crit :
2. As to answering your question: Trying to understand/model the star
formation rate of the universe has been a major research area for
decades (e.g., try the search term "star formation history of the uni=
verse"
in google scholar or the ADS). But most of this focuses on the *past=
*
star formation rate. I'm sure there are studies trying to forecast
this into the future, but I don't have references handy.
-- jt]]

Yes, the past is easier to read than the future.

The future of the Universe?

I do not see any data that we could gather that could answer that
question. Even trying to figure out the observable universe is hard to
do for the future.

With most theories in a state of flux, dark matter, dark energy... we
are in the dark and there is no scientific answer to that question now.

Scientists shouldn't be afraid of saying "I do not know" when that is
the case. And the future of the universe, the origin of life and man,
are till now unanswered questions.

Nobody knows.

Can research about the future of the observable universe be done now?

Yes, we can extrapolate "some day the energy will be used up and will
provoke the lights going out". The thermical death of thermodynamics, we
are doomed. This has been proposed (in diverse forms) since ages. And
all those speculations are correct within the frames of their respective
theories, that get soon obsolete, as knowledge advances.

[[Mod. note -- I think the author's last sentence is quite similar to
a classic logical fallacy, conflating different "amounts of wrongness".
The late Isaac Asimov wrote a far better explanation of, and rejoinder
to, this fallacy than anything I could write, and I think his essay is
very relevant he

Isaac Asimov
"The Relativity of Wrong"
The Skeptical Inquirer, Fall 1989, Vol. 14, No. 1, Pp. 35-44
http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScien...ityofWrong.htm

-- jt]]