Cosmic Voids tagged posts

This simulation of the large-scale structure of the universe reveals the cosmic web of galaxies and the vast, empty regions known as voids. Credit: Image by Nico Hamaus, Universitäts-Sternwarte München, courtesy of The Ohio State University

A lot of information contained in cosmic voids, study suggests. An international team of astronomers reports that they were able to achieve 4X better precision in measurements of how the universe’s visible matter is clustered together by studying the empty spaces in between. Researchers looking for new ways to probe gravity and dark energy adopted a new strategy: looking at what’s not there.

Paul Sutter, Ohio State University, said that the new measurements can help bring astronomers closer to testing Einstein’s general theory of relativity, which des...

A slab cut from the cube generated by the Illustris simulation. It shows the distribution of dark matter, with a width and height of 350 million light-years and a thickness of 300000 light years. Galaxies are found in the small, white, high-density dots. Credit: Markus Haider / Illustris collaboration. Click for a full size image

We live in a universe dominated by unseen matter, and on the largest scales, galaxies and everything they contain are concentrated into filaments that stretch around the edge of enormous voids. Thought to be almost empty until now, astronomers now believe these dark holes could contain as much as 20% of the ‘normal’ matter in the cosmos and that galaxies make up only 1/500th of the volume of the universe.

Looking at cosmic microwave radiation, modern satellite obs...