The universe should be teeming with dark matter but there is still no evidence for it. Image courtesy of NASA / WMAP Science Team.
Joel Kontinen
According to Big Bang cosmology, approximately 83 per cent of the universe’s mass should be dark matter. (The estimates vary greatly. Recently, Nature news put the figure at over 80 per cent.)
The problem is that there is no evidence for dark matter. The concept is used to explain away some of the problems in the Big Bang view.
Some astronomers think that dark matter does not even exist.
Recently, Christian Moni Bidin at the University of Concepcion in Chile and colleagues surveyed 400 stars in the area near the Sun. They did not find any evidence for dark matter.
It thus seems that the existence of dark matter stems not from evidence but from assumptions. And without dark matter the Big Bang has big problems.
Source:
Cowen, Ron. 2012. Survey finds no hint of dark matter near Solar System. Nature news (19 April).
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