HONG KONG: Dark matter is a hypothetical type of matter, invisible to the human eye, that binds galaxies together and accounts for about 80 percent of all the matter in the universe. Scientists believe dark matter exists because the galactic structure of the universe simply cannot be explained without it.
Now, for the first time, an international group of more than 300 scientists from six countries participating in what is known as the Dark Energy Survey (DES) have released an actual map of dark matter, according to a report by BBC News. The collaborators will present their initial findings April 14 at a meeting of the American Physical Society.
The map was created using images from a 570-megapixel camera mounted on the Victor Blanco telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory perched high in the Chilean Andes. Although the preliminary data covers only 0.4 percent of the heavens, the survey’s goal is to one day map a full one-eighth of the sky.
Because dark matter emits no light, the astrophysicists are able to detect it only by the way it warps light emitted from far-away galaxies. To ‘see’ it, they have to identify minute distortions caused by dark matter’s gravitational warping or ‘lensing’ of light as it passes by.
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