Probing visible and dust-obscured star formation and physical properties of galaxies from primordial epochs to the Local Universe is key to understanding the formation and evolution of galaxies. Following a "local cosmology approach", this talk will focus on a class of highly star-forming, low-mass, metal-poor dwarf galaxies at redshift 0 and compare their properties with recently discovered star-forming galaxies at redshift z>6. In particular, scaling relations of stellar mass, star-formation rate (SFR), gas and dust content, and metal abundance will be used to assess whether local galaxies are realistic proxies to help interpret the physical properties of galaxies near the epoch of reionization.