The dark between the stars

The dark between the stars: dark matter and dark energy

Date: Wednesday 23rd June, 2027

Time: 16:00 – 17:30

Location: Main Hall, Whickham School, NE16 5AR

 

Overview

Something is deeply wrong with the way galaxies rotate.  This may seem like a highly abstract concern, but it troubled Jan Oort and Fritz Zwicky in the 1930s, leading them to propose that the universe is filled with vast amounts of invisible “dark” matter that we can’t see.    This discovery was largely ignored until it was picked up by Vera Rubin in the 1970s.  We now know that there is 4-5 times more of this dark matter than the normal atoms we’re used to – and on scales far larger than galaxies.  Worse still, in the 1990s we learned that some unknown form of “dark” energy is driving Hubble’s expansion to accelerate, leading the universe to grow at an ever-faster rate.

What the hell is going on?    How can the universe be filled with stuff we can’t see?   What is it made of?   In the final lecture of this year, we’ll “stand on the shoulders of giants” from Oort, to Rubin, to the titans of today, and understand how the “dark between the stars” isn’t just incidental to our universe, but a critical part of it.

Image credit: N.A. Sharp/KPNO/NOIRLab/NSO/NSF/AURA  CC-BY 4.0

 

Bookings

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