Cosmological Constraints on Terrestrial Planet Formation
I attempt to piece together a consistent scenario based on current estimates of the evolution of the star formation rate of the Universe, the metallicity evolution of the star-forming regions of the Universe and the most recent observations of extrasolar planets. The precision of all of these data sets is improving rapidly, but they can already be combined to yield an estimate of the age distribution of earth-like planets in the Universe (Lineweaver 2001, astro-ph/0012399).