NORTH-EAST scientists have been awarded a prize for their work mapping the universe.

A team that included scientists from Durham University received the first Group Achievement Award from the Royal Astronomical Society.

The team of 33 spent ten years mapping 220,000 galaxies.

The Durham contributors - Professor Carlos Frenk, Prof Shaun Cole, Dr Carlton Baugh and Dr Vince Eke, of the university's Institute of Computational Cosmology - helped analyse the findings.

A key finding was that most of our universe is made of mysterious dark energy, which is causing its expansion to accelerate.

Prof Frenk said: "This is a well-deserved