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Dark Matter, Dark Energy

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Dark
Matter,
Dark
Energy
SAMREENA QAISER
F2019070024
DEPARTMENT OF MATHEMATICS
SCHOOL OF SCIENCE
UNIVERSITY OF M A N A G E M E N T A ND
TECHNOLOGY, LAHORE

RESOURCE PERSON
DR. MUHAMMAD IMRAN JAMIL
D E P A R T M E N T OF P H Y S C I S
SCHOOL OF SCIENCE
 1

Table of Contents
Executive Summary ..................................................................................................... 2
Background .................................................................................................................. 2
What is Dark Energy and Dark Matter? ...................................................................... 3
Meet the Supernovae .................................................................................................... 5
How supernovas aid in the understanding of dark energy? .......................................... 6
Einstein’s Theory of Gravity........................................................................................ 7
Large Hadron Colliders (LHC) .................................................................................... 7
Discussion .................................................................................................................... 8
Conclusion.................................................................................................................... 9
References .................................................................................................................. 10
 2

Executive Summary
In this review report, we will discuss about the mysterious matter and energy that
exists, although invisible yet somehow discernible. Scientists have somehow
found ways to detect bizarre energy and matter that holds our Universe together.
What gives more mystical vibes about dark matter and dark energy, apart from the
name, is that it is said to be 95% of the matter and energy that can be found in our
Universe. The visible matter and energy with which are familiar only covers
roughly 5%. What is this energy and matter? Is it even there? If yes, why isn’t it
visible? Why, even with a boost in our technology, we are not able to clearly
understand this phenomenon? We’ll try to understand these questions till the end
of this report.

Background
Einstein’s famous ‘Cosmological Constant’ was the first step towards what was, in
1998, dubbed as Dark Energy. Einstein’s theory of the cosmological constant was
basically a counteract to the force of gravity in his theory of general relativity that
said the universe was static or in other words, was not expanding. When Edwin
Hubble claimed that the Universe, in fact, was expanding. After this Einstein
claimed the cosmological constant, his greatest blunder. But when the mass and
energy amount for the expansion of the universe was too low, the missing
component to describe it was said to be the cosmological component.
The existence of dark matter was first hypothesized by Swiss Astronomer, Fritz
Zwicky in 1933, when he discovered that the mass required, in the Coma Cluster
of Galaxies to keep the galaxies from escaping the gravitational force of the
cluster, was in fact made up of only 1% of the total mass. This missing mass was a
mystery to Astronomers for decades.
 3

What is Dark Energy and Dark

Matter?
In the 1970’s, Vera Rubin and W. Kent
Ford claimed the existence of such
phenomenon. The mass of the stars
observable which was within that galaxy
was only nearly about 10% of the mass
necessary to keep the stars and planets to
orbit the center of that galaxy. The speed
of stars orbiting the centers of their
galaxy was not dependent on their
distance from the center of the galaxy.
This accounted for the mass of the Figure 2 Dark Matter

galaxy within the orbit of the star was

supposed to increase linearly as the
distance of the stars decreases from the center of the galaxy. But inner mass showed
no light which was then named dark matter. As the dark matter was confirmed, a
majority of such matter has been detected throughout galaxies and clusters of
galaxies with the use of gravitational lensing. Dark energy, on the other hand, is
detected through its ramification rate at which the universe expands and
its culmination rate on larger
structures like galaxies and clusters
through the gravitational instabilities.
These are detected with telescopes that
use distance and redshifts to measure
the expansion rates of astronomical
objects. (Riess, Dark Energy, 2017)
Dark energy is the force that repels and
is made up of almost 69.4% of the
Figure 1 Pie chart showing the distribution of Dark Energy,
Dark universe. This energy is
Matter and Atoms
relatively
uniform to space and time and has a
 4

repulsive gravitation unlike the regular gravitation. This energy can be observed
through the intrinsic brightness of a celestial object. In this case we can talk about
the Type 1a Supernovas. A suitably large spectrograph and a telescope is all you
need to observe the galaxies that
are receding from our own galaxy.
This receding causes a redshift in
light that reaches the Earth from
those galaxies. (Riess, Dark
matter, 2017)
The frequencies of the light that we
receive are shifted towards the lower
end of the spectrum which in turn
gives a redshift, this effect is known
as the Doppler Effect. But this is
way more challenging because the
celestial objects in deep space are
pretty dim. Fortunately, astronomers
were blessed with nature's gift of
Type 1a Supernova Explosion. The
comparison of observed luminosity
of the Type 1a Supernova to the
luminosity of the nearby objects
revealed distances.
Supernovas have the same kind of
elements and thus they have similar
frequencies with which we can Figure 3 Dark Matter Simulation
measure redshifts and thus the
speed. (Johnston, 2016)
A hypothesis by astronomers says that the universe consists of more matter than
can be seen by the naked eye. This boosted the support of the thesis and it has
grown since even though there is no direct and solid evidence that dark matter
exists. But in recent years, many strong possibilities have risen.
 5

The big question that arose here is if scientists cannot see dark matter how they
know it exists?
Calculation of motion of large objects and their mass has led scientists to see
material in the center moving with a speed faster than the one's on the edge
outwards. But scientists found that this is not the case. Both types of objects,
regardless of their distance from the center, had same velocities. This predicted
that the galaxy had more mass than that was possibly seen. Galaxies and Clusters
of galaxies would move apart if they only consisted of the regular visible matter.
As we know that light bends when it moves across massive objects that distorts it
and hence creating a lens. The distortion of such light is used to study galaxy
clusters and thus they have mapped out the dark matter. A sensitive particle
detector known as the AMS (Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer) was installed in the
International Space Station in 2011. The AMS detected more than a hundred
billion cosmic rays. It measured an excess of positrons which can come from dark
matter. It can also be of some other astrophysical source so still more data is
required. (Dark Energy, n.d.)

Meet the Supernovae

To identify if a discovery of a supernova or not, a spectrum is needed. These
require sufficiently large telescopes that create such spectrum splitting the fainter
light enough to identify distant supernovae. Large enough telescopes which use
huge mirrors of about 8 meter or more
enable scientists and astronomers to
observe these supernovas. The distance of
a supernova can be determined on the
basis of its brightness. But this gets tricky
because not all supernovae tend to have
the same amount of brightness.
Supernovae's brightness is at its peak over
a period of 18 days and this is exactly what
we need to measure. The brighter
supernovas take about 3 weeks to achieve
Figure 4 Type 1a
Supernova
 6

its brightness peak and appear to be bluer. The dimmer's ones achieve this in 2
weeks and appear to be redder. (Johnston, 2016)

How supernovas aid in the understanding of dark energy?

The existence of supernovas indicated dark energy per unit volume was, in fact,
constant throughout the universe. Unlike the matter we see on Earth that gets
diluted, dark energy doesn't and so as the universe expanded and doubled in size
so did the dark energy.

Figure 5 graph showing the change of redshifts of a supernova

It was in the late 90's when two teams, High-z Supernova Search Team and the
Supernova Cosmology Project, were determined to calculated the distances of far-
away supernovae for comparisons with the close ones. At that time, it was
anticipated that the universe was decelerating with the passage of time due the
compound gravitation of all the galaxies. But this was not the case, instead it was
exactly the opposite and thus, it gave a new viewpoint to astronomers and
scientists. But this, too, needed and explanation as the universe must have some
 7

mysterious energy that needed to accelerate it and we couldn't see it that is why
it's called dark energy. (Howell, n.d.)

Einstein’s Theory of Gravity

Einstein realized that empty space was not really empty. One of the versions of the
theory of gravity that consists of the cosmological constant suggests that empty
space can have its own energy. As this energy is a property of space itself, it
cannot be diluted due to the expansion. This causes the universe to expand faster.
Quantum theory suggest another explanation of how space acquires energy, but
this went horribly wrong when the answer that came out was almost 10120 times
too big to be the energy that gives to empty space. At last, a possibility rises that
Einstein's theory of gravity is incorrect. This would affect the expansion of the
universe as well as how regular matter behaved in galaxies.
It provides a solution to make decision if we need a new gravity theory for dark
energy or not? But if we needed a new theory of gravity, how would affect our
understanding of the motion of celestial bodies? And so, the mystery continues.
Dark energy possibilities are still in need or more and better data.

Large Hadron Colliders (LHC)

The LHC is a 28-kilometer ring that accelerates protons at the nearly the speed of
light before they collide. This starts with a bottle of hydrogen gas that is sent through
an electric field. This procedure separates the electrons and only the protons remain.
Magnetic and Electric fields are what is used in a particle accelerator. Protons are
positively charged and hence accelerate inside an electric
 8

field and are bend inside a magnetic field in circle. This achievement n particle
physics has amazing effects in research. (Hesketh, 2015)
Many researchers suggest that the dark energy can be a different type of force or
field that changes the mechanism of gravity. If this turns out to be true then
scientists may be able to include the right amount of energy into that field until it a
particle pops out. Such a particle could substantially show up in the LHC

Figure 6 Large Hadron Collider, CERN

detector. The presence of particle of dark matter in such a collision can be the
missing crossway momentum. Scientists add up the particle’s momenta that can
be seen in the LHC detectors and see if there is any momentum missing before
collision. The total momentum must be zero after collision, if it is not the case
then there must be some unidentified dark matter particles.

Discussion
Dark matter is all the mass in the universe that we cannot see and there is a lot of it!
Its invisible as it does not interact with light and so we have no way of seeing it.
 9

This matter can be felt, if not seen and it has a strong impact on our universe. Dark
matter exerts the regular gravitational force that attracts regular matter towards it,
unlike dark energy that has a repulsive gravitational force. (Sutter, 2017)
This dark matter gravitational force is strong enough to hold entire galaxies
together. It also has a distortion effect on space. Distant galaxies, when observed,
appear to be stretched, also known as gravitational lensing. This gravitational force
also bends light. The relic radiation that was left after the Big Bang, helps
scientists identify where there is more radiation in space and as more radiation
exists so does more matter. Dark matter is some sort of exotic unidentified particle
unlike the regular particles we already know about. Dark matter may be nothing at
all so, some scientists believe that we have associated dark matter with the effects
that are caused by gravity.

Conclusion
An intense debate is ongoing on the subject of the measured value of dark energy.
The use of cosmic way background has led many researchers to achieve the power
of dark energy. Although researchers and scientists don't have the exact idea of
what dark energy is, they have created models to understand and explain
everything. Some of these models suggests that the universe will be ripped apart
by the dark energy after billions of years. An explanation says that dark energy is a
type of restricted energy that was essential in the fabric of space- time.
There is still so much to know about dark matter and we may not ever get to the
actual truth. Dark matter is mysterious and complex but the all over the world
scientists continue to hunt the truth and what they may find someday could
change the viewpoint of the world about our cosmos.
 10

References
CERN. n.d. Dark matter. https://home.cern/science/physics/dark-matter.
Charley, Sarah. 2019. Taking a collider to the dark energy problem. 14 February.
https://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/taking-a-collider-to-the-dark-energy-problem.
2017. Dark Energy. 8 December. https://www.britannica.com/science/dark-energy.

Emspak, Jesse. 2017. Dark Energy May Lurk in the Nothingness of Space. 31 May.
https://www.space.com/37043-why-universe-is-accelerating.html.
Hesketh, Gavin. 2015. Explainer: how does an experiment at the Large Hadron Collider work? 5 June.
https://theconversation.com/explainer-how-does-an-experiment-at-the-large-hadron-collider- work-
42846.
Howell, D. Andrew. 2013. Illuminating Dark Energy with Supernovae. August.
https://www.americanscientist.org/article/illuminating-dark-energy-with-supernovae.
Johnston, Hamish. 2016. Supernovae analysis finds scant evidence for dark energy. 21 October.
https://physicsworld.com/a/supernovae-analysis-finds-scant-evidence-for-dark-
energy/#:~:text=The%20teams%20found%20that%20more,wavelengths%20when%20observed
%20on%20Earth.
Lopes, Ana. 2020. Breaking new ground in the search for dark matter. 7 August.
https://home.cern/news/series/lhc-physics-ten/breaking-new-ground-search-dark-
matter#:~:text=The%20Large%20Hadron%20Collider%20(LHC,equally%20exciting%20particle%3
A%20the%20hypothetical.
Mann, Adam. 2019. What Is Dark Energy? 21 August. https://www.livescience.com/what-is-dark-
energy.html.
NASA. n.d. Dark Energy, Dark Matter. https://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/what-is-dark-
energy.
Redd, Nola Taylor. 2019. What Is Dark Matter? 19 July. https://www.space.com/20930-dark-
matter.html.
Riess, Adam. 2017. Dark Matter. 8 December. https://www.britannica.com/science/dark-matter. Sutter,

Paul. 2017. Does Dark Energy Exist? 28 June. https://www.space.com/37323-does-dark-energy-

exist.html.
Technology, Swinburne University of. n.d. Dark Energy.
https://astronomy.swin.edu.au/cosmos/d/Dark+Energy.

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