Lately there has been some discussion between academics that if Dark Energy is real or not. Some scientist proposed that MOND Theory could be real instead of Dark Matter and Dark Energy theories. Now we knew that Dark Matter is almost certainly real because we had tons of indirect evidence but for Dark Energy, we had none. Now we do have it. The following video and article explains how.
Our universe is a mysterious place. Only 4 percent or so is made up of the ordinary matter we see around us, including all those galaxies filled with stars. The rest, physicists believe, is made of up weakly interacting dark matter, and a mysterious substance called dark energy that is causing the cosmos to expand at an accelerating rate.
At least, that's the working hypothesis, and it seems to fit the data, although there are scientists who question its existence and tout alternatives to explain that accelerating expansion.
A new, two-year study by scientists at the University of Portsmouth and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen concludes that dark energy does, indeed, exist. Those results just appeared in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
Finally a topic to masquerade over the atrocities from Asia.
+ As a science majored student in Physics, I'm in awe. People 5 years from now on will probably learn this in textbook and such while I'm still learning about Lorentz's factor and its relation with gravity.
As somebody who had been working on Dark Energy research there are about 5 of these discoveries a year. And this has been going on for several years and they awarded the Nobel Prize for its discovery this year.
I also worked with a doctor out of UMD who professed MOND(Modified Newtonian Gravity) and sad to say that research was discredited years ago.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Dark Energy has been 100% solid science for a while now. There were no recent discoveries made but there are a lot of very "Eager" astronomers.
Ok, cool. "proven" is a bit sensational maybe. I like "re-confirmed" as they use in the url you linked more, and I feel it is more accurate. But nice anyways. Putting more empirical weight behind dark energy. Not really sure how shaky the measurements were without this, can anyone enlighten us? edit: ok thanks tehnerf, it was pretty solid even before it seems, thanks.
On September 17 2012 10:02 Thenerf wrote: As somebody who had been working on Dark Energy research there are about 5 of these discoveries a year. And this has been going on for several years and they awarded the Nobel Prize for its discovery this year.
I also worked with a doctor out of UMD who professed MOND(Modified Newtonian Gravity) and sad to say that research was discredited years ago.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Dark Energy has been 100% solid science for a while now. There were no recent discoveries made but there are a lot of very "Eager" astronomers.
Do you know which the most popular candidates for dark energy are for the moment? Vacuum fluctuations? Some supergravity/strings? Other things? Any hope to experimentally exclude/confirm any theory anytime soon?
On September 17 2012 09:51 Aerisky wrote: Whoa, this is cool stuff. Could be making its way into the textbook quite soon :o
I wonder whether dark energy could be harnessed, though it seems like how he "lose" energy as heat etc in that you can't just capture it.
it's there already! even my intro to astrophysics book had a chapter on this. I think the view of most scientists is that there is definitely weird shit going on, and we can quantify exactly how weird the shit is and how it behaves through observations like the one in this article. but exactly what the weird shit is is a matter of much debate.
The is cool and all, but it doesn't mean all that much for the current now. Many physicists already thought dark energy existed, so this test doesn't change much of anything, same with the higgs test.
On September 17 2012 10:02 Thenerf wrote: As somebody who had been working on Dark Energy research there are about 5 of these discoveries a year. And this has been going on for several years and they awarded the Nobel Prize for its discovery this year.
I also worked with a doctor out of UMD who professed MOND(Modified Newtonian Gravity) and sad to say that research was discredited years ago.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Dark Energy has been 100% solid science for a while now. There were no recent discoveries made but there are a lot of very "Eager" astronomers.
Do you know which the most popular candidates for dark energy are for the moment? Vacuum fluctuations? Some supergravity/strings? Other things? Any hope to experimentally exclude/confirm any theory anytime soon?
The "mainstream" theory is quantum foam which is closely associated with the same logic used to derive the Higgs Boson mechanism. However, there is no observable evidence to support this model. Essentially that there is an energy based on quantum uncertainty that will spontaneously cause nothing to turn into particles. That splitting creates and expanding force of energy.
My research dealt with what's called Invariant Time dilation wherein dark energy is a form of warped space in which the relative clock is faster. As opposed to gravity which has a slower relative clock. There is evidence to support this but unfortunately it's surprising hard to convince a community of old, bitter, and generally full of themselves men that they might be wrong.
In order for physics to reach actual advancements you need to plow through all of the shit which usually takes decades. And dark energy was only discovered in the 90's.
I'd also like to note that String Theories don't actually predict anything. They are pretty much just an outlet for the very math minded people in physics to just keep adding dimensions. It usually goes like this: "You know what's better than 21 dimensions? 22!" I have actually been in the room with string theorists and this is how they see things.
On September 17 2012 10:02 Thenerf wrote: As somebody who had been working on Dark Energy research there are about 5 of these discoveries a year. And this has been going on for several years and they awarded the Nobel Prize for its discovery this year.
I also worked with a doctor out of UMD who professed MOND(Modified Newtonian Gravity) and sad to say that research was discredited years ago.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Dark Energy has been 100% solid science for a while now. There were no recent discoveries made but there are a lot of very "Eager" astronomers.
doesnt most of this science rely on the CMB data produced by wmap, which may not be entirely accurate?
EPT
I like "re-confirmed" as they use in the url you linked more, and I feel it is more accurate. But nice anyways. Putting more empirical weight behind dark energy. Not really sure how shaky the measurements were without this, can anyone enlighten us?
