Image Source: NASA
BY KERRY LEARY
A monumental discovery in space could lead
to answers about the cosmic glue in the universe...
the dark matter that helps hold the cosmos
together.
But the discovery came at a price.
It was found through the AMS — or Alpha
Magnetic Spectrometer- experiment — the
most expensive experiment ever carried out
in space.
The price tag?
$2 billion.
The good news is the cosmic ray detector may
have found the first hint of dark matter--
something that’s never been directly observed.
But how does it work?
Space.com reports:
“Exploding stars and other cosmic phenomena
are thought to produce cosmic rays which travel
across the universe and wash up on the shores
of our planet.”
Those rays are composed of charged particles
— but many of them are absorbed in the atmosphere
which makes them impossible to study on earth.
The AMS is able to sift through the particles
called “positrons.”
Some scientists believe positrons are produced
when dark matter particles collide.
The Telegraph reports, “Dark matter is thought
to hold galaxies together and give the universe
its structure, but very little else is known
about it because it is invisible and does
not interact with light or any of the atoms
which make up the stars and planets.”
But a writer for Science spoke with a cosmic
ray physicist who thinks the hypotheses drawn
from this experiment aren’t necessarily
the only explanations for the excess positrons.
”Excess positrons can emerge from other,
more mundane astrophysical mechanisms ... For
example, a nearby radiation-spewing neutron
star called a pulsar could crank out energetic
positrons.
So even though the positron excess appears
to be real, it is not a smoking gun for dark
matter.”
The paper describing the new discoveries is
carefully worded because nothing is confirmed
yet, which means research will continue to
determine whether the excess comes from dark-matter
collisions or another source.
