dark matter tagged posts

How Heavy is Dark Matter? Scientists radically narrow the potential mass range for the first time

Credit: Greg Rakozy on Unsplash

Scientists have calculated the mass range for Dark Matter – and it’s tighter than the science world thought. Their findings – due to be published in Physics Letters B in March – radically narrow the range of potential masses for Dark Matter particles, and help to focus the search for future Dark Matter-hunters. The University of Sussex researchers used the established fact that gravity acts on Dark Matter just as it acts on the visible universe to work out the lower and upper limits of Dark Matter’s mass.

The results show that Dark Matter cannot be either ‘ultra-light’ or ‘super-heavy’, as some have theorised, unless an as-yet undiscovered force also acts upon it.

The team used the assumption that the only force acting on Dark Matter is gravity, an...

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X-Rays surrounding ‘Magnificent 7’ may be Traces of Sought-after Particle

An artistic rendering of the XMM-Newton (X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission) space telescope. A study of archival data from the XMM-Newton and the Chandra X-ray space telescopes found evidence of high levels of X-ray emission from the nearby Magnificent Seven neutron stars, which may arise from the hypothetical particles known as axions. (Credits: D. Ducros, ESA/XMM-Newton, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO)

Researchers say they may have found proof of theorized axions, and possibly dark matter, around group of neutron stars. A new study, led by a theoretical physicist at the U.S...

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Primordial Black Holes and the Search for Dark Matter from the Multiverse

. Baby universes branching off of our universe shortly after the Big Bang appear to us as black holes. (Credit:Kavli IPMU)

Astronomers are studying black holes that could have formed in the early universe, before stars and galaxies were born. Such primordial black holes (PBHs) could account for all or part of dark matter, be responsible for some of the observed gravitational waves signals, and seed supermassive black holes found in the center of our Galaxy and other galaxies.

The Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (Kavli IPMU) is home to many interdisciplinary projects which benefit from the synergy of a wide range of expertise available at the institute...

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Next step in Simulating the Universe

Researchers led by the University of Tsukuba devise a new approach to show how ghost-like neutrinos helped shape the Universe

New approach to show how ghost-like neutrinos helped shape the Universe. Computer simulations have struggled to capture the impact of elusive particles called neutrinos on the formation and growth of the large-scale structure of the Universe. But now, a research team from Japan has developed a method that overcomes this hurdle.

In a study published this month in The Astrophysical Journal, researchers led by the University of Tsukuba present simulations that accurately depict the role of neutrinos in the evolution of the Universe.

Why are these simulations important? One key reason is that they can set constraints on a currently unknown quantity: the neutri...

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