Vol.
I September 1st – 6th, 2009
IT IS ALL SO DARK OUT THERE
We’ve been uncovering some
of the most unexpected secrets
of the universe, lately. No one
has been able to provide a
satisfactory explanation for
these, hence making them
retain the dark truth behind
them and behind all
interconnected phenomena;
and for that simple reason,
we’ve been calling (like you
might have guessed) dark.
To name a few, we
have dark matter, dark energy,
and dark flow – all of which
we will briefly discuss this
week.
In astronomy and
cosmology, dark matter is
hypothetical matter that is
undetectable by its emitted
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Issue 1
radiation, but whose presence
can be inferred from
gravitational effects on visible
matter. According to present
observations of structures
larger than galaxies, as well as
Big Bang cosmology, dark
matter and dark energy could
account for the vast majority
of the mass in the observable
universe. Dark matter is
postulated to partially account
for evidence of "missing
mass" in the universe,
including the rotational speeds
of galaxies, orbital velocities
of galaxies in clusters,
gravitational lensing of
background objects by galaxy
clusters such as the Bullet
Cluster, and the temperature
distribution of hot gas in
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galaxies and clusters
galaxies.
Dark matter is believed to play
a central role in structure
formation and galaxy
evolution, and has measurable
effects on the anisotropy of
the cosmic microwave
background. All these lines of
evidence suggest that galaxies,
clusters of galaxies, and the
universe as a whole contain
far more matter than that
which interacts with
electromagnetic radiation: the
remainder is frequently called
the "dark matter component,"
even though there is a small
amount of baryonic dark
matter (i.e. dark matter
composed of baryons, i.e.
protons and neutrons).
Dark energy is a
hypothetical form of energy
that permeates all of space and
tends to increase the rate of
expansion of the universe.
Dark energy is the most
popular way to explain recent
observations that the universe
appears to be expanding at an
accelerating rate. In the
standard model of cosmology,
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of dark energy currently accounts
for 74% of the total mass-
energy of the universe.
Two proposed forms for dark
energy are the cosmological
constant, a constant energy
density filling space
homogeneously, and scalar
fields such as quintessence or
moduli, dynamic quantities
whose energy density can vary
in time and space.
Contributions from scalar
fields that are constant in
space are usually also
included in the cosmological
constant. The cosmological
constant is physically
equivalent to vacuum energy.
Scalar fields which do change
in space can be difficult to
distinguish from a
cosmological constant because
the change may be extremely
slow.
High-precision measurements
of the expansion of the
universe are required to
understand how the expansion
rate changes over time. In
general relativity, the
evolution of the expansion
rate is parameterized by the
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cosmological equation of
state. Measuring the equation
of state of dark energy is one
of the biggest efforts in
observational cosmology
today.
Dark flow is a
name given to a net motion of
galaxy clusters with respect to
the cosmic microwave
background radiation which
was found in a 2008 study.
According to standard
cosmological models, the
motion of galaxy clusters with
respect to the cosmic
microwave background should
be randomly distributed in all
directions. However,
analyzing the three-year
WMAP data using the
kinematic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich
effect (or simply SZ effect),
the authors of the study found
evidence of a common motion
of at least 600 km/s toward a
20-degree patch of sky
between the constellations of
Centaurus and Vela.
The authors suggest that the
motion may be a remnant of
the influence of no-longer-
visible regions of the universe
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prior to inflation. Telescopes
cannot see events earlier than
about 380,000 years after the
Big Bang, when the universe
became transparent (the
Cosmic Microwave
Background); this corresponds
to the particle horizon at a
distance of about 46 billion
(4.6×1010) light years. Since
the matter causing the net
motion in this proposal is
outside this range, it would in
a certain sense be outside our
visible universe; however, it
would still be in our past light
cone.
The results appear in the
October 20, 2008, issue of
Astrophysical Journal Letters,
(which is available online).
The authors state that they
plan to extend their analysis to
additional clusters and the
recently released WMAP five-
year data.
Astrophysicist Ned Wright
posted an online response to
the study arguing that its
methods are flawed. The
authors of the dark flow study
released a statement in return,
refuting three of Wright's five
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arguments and identifying the
remaining two as a typo and a
technicality that do not affect
the measurements and their
interpretation.
All-in-all, the best
(and, in fact, the only) thing
we could do – apart from
some ingenious research – is
wait till some light is shed on
this dark issues!

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