Access

News and Views

Nature 456, 44-45 (6 November 2008) | doi:10.1038/456044a; Published online 5 November 2008

Open Innovation Challenges

naturejobs

Astrophysics: An illuminating dark halo

Stéphane Colombi1

Top

A large simulation reveals that most of the detectable signal from dark matter in our Milky Way probably comes from the main, smooth Galactic halo, rather than from small clumps.

Most of the mass of the Universe is believed to be in the form of dark matter — an invisible component that has so far been only indirectly detected through the effects of its gravity on visible matter. In the theory of supersymmetry in particle physics, there is a corresponding dark-matter-particle candidate that interacts only very weakly with the rest of the Universe, and is thus very difficult to detect directly.

  1. Stéphane Colombi is at the Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris, CNRS UMR 7095/Université Pierre et Marie Curie, 98 bis boulevard Arago, 75014 Paris, France.
    Email: colombi@iap.fr

MORE ARTICLES LIKE THIS

These links to content published by NPG are automatically generated.

NEWS AND VIEWS

Unveiling a new galaxy

Nature News and Views (03 Nov 1994)

Galactic archaeology Overcoming great barriers

Nature Physics News and Views (01 Jul 2009)

See all 8 matches for News And Views