Where oh where is the dark matter? Cosmologists have a problem. They've posited the existence of so-called “dark matter” as the explanation for why the observable mass (mainly in stars and nebulae) is less than could possibly account for the gravitational effects observed in the motions of stars and galaxies. There were originally quite a few candidates (mainly different kinds of sub-atomic particles) proposed as the culprit, but one by one these have been getting knocked out.
Now a bunch of them have bitten the dust,
ruled out by the LUX detector (more on
Science News ($)). These results need to be duplicated, so they can't be called definitive yet – but it's not looking good for the particle candidates. And if not them, then what?
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