![]() ![]() Aided by the gravitating power of the dark component, ordinary matter was pulled into clumps, which later evolved into galaxies that spawned stars, planets and, in one case at least, life.Ī consensus has emerged that dark matter mostly consists of massive particles coughed out of the big bang. ![]() After the big bang that created the universe 13.7bn years ago, matter was spread smoothly through space. And its role in shaping the cosmos is crucial. Today, cosmologists can put a precise figure on the amount of dark matter in the universe: about five times the mass of the luminous, common-or-garden variety of matter. So what keeps them intact? The simplest explanation is that some form of dark matter provides the necessary gravitationally binding. The astronomer Fritz Zwicky noticed that within the clusters, galaxies mill around so fast that the clusters ought to fly apart. ![]() The first inkling that the universe is dominated by unseen material came from the observations of clusters of galaxies made in the 1930s. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |