Hubble and Chandra Discover Dark Matter Is Not as Sticky as Once Thought

March 26, 2015 2:00PM (EDT)Release ID: 2015-10
Hubble and Chandra Discover Dark Matter Is Not as Sticky as Once Thought

Summary

In particle physics labs, like the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, scientists smash atoms together to study the underpinnings of matter and energy. On the scale of the macrocosm, nature provides a similar experiment by crashing clusters of galaxies together. Besides galaxies and gas, the galaxy clusters contain huge amounts of dark matter. Dark matter is a transparent form of matter that makes up most of the mass in the universe. During collisions, the clouds of gas enveloping the galaxies crash into each other and slow down or stop. Astronomers found that the dark matter continued straight through the violent collisions, without slowing down relative to the galaxies. Their best explanation is that the dark matter did not interact with visible particles, and it also interacted less frequently with other dark matter than previously thought. Astronomers used the Hubble Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory to study 72 large galaxy cluster collisions. Chandra traced the hot gas, and Hubble saw how the invisible dark matter warps space and distorts the images of background stars. This allowed for the distribution of dark matter in the collision to be mapped. The finding narrows down the options for what this dark matter might be.

Full Article

Astronomers using observations from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory have found that dark matter does not slow down when colliding with each other. This means that it interacts with itself even less than previously thought. Researchers say this finding narrows down the options for what this mysterious substance might be. Dark matter is a transparent form of matter that makes up most of the mass in the universe. Because dark matter does not reflect, absorb, or emit light, it can only be traced indirectly, such as by measuring how it warps space through gravitational lensing, ...

Read More on NASA.gov

Callout: Full Press Release

Visit NASA Science to view the full news release including article text and associated Hubble imagery, graphics, scientific visualizations, videos, captions, text descriptions, and other information.

News releases highlighting the discoveries of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope are produced for NASA by the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, under NASA Contract NAS5-26555. News release content is developed by the News Team in STScI’s Office of Public Outreach.

End callout
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google

Contact our News Team 

Contact our Outreach Office