  The dramatic confrontation between new observations and theories of the early
and recent universe makes cosmology one of the most rapidly advancing fields in
the physical sciences. The universe is a unique laboratory in which to probe
fundamental physics, the rationale being to start from fundamental physics
inspired models and explore their consequences in sufficient quantitative
detail to be able to identify key astrophysical and cosmological tests of the
underlying theory (or developing new tests when appropriate). An unprecedented
number of such tests will be possible in the coming years, by exploiting the
ever improving observational data. In this spirit I will highlight some open
issues in cosmology and particle physics and provide some motivation for this
symposium.
