Friday, December 18, 2009

Dark Matter - The first glimpses?

BBC News - The first glimpse of dark matter?

Computer generated image of the Universe, in which dark matter is shown in pink

US scientists have reported the detection of signals that could indicate the presence of dark matter.

A team announced on Thursday detecting two events with characteristics "consistent with" what physicists believe make up the elusive matter.

The main announcement came from the Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago.

The scientists were keen to stress that they could not confirm that what they had seen was definitely dark matter.

"While this result is consistent with dark matter, it is also consistent with backgrounds," said Fermilab's director, Pier Oddone.

Several US universities and institutes have contributed to the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS), an experiment designed to detect the dark matter particles.

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