Dark Matter May Be Building Up Inside the Sun

[n2doc]

By Lisa Grossman

The sun could be a net for dark matter, a new study suggests. If dark matter happens to take a certain specific form, it could build up in our nearest star and alter how heat moves inside it in a way that would be observable from Earth.

Dark matter is the mysterious stuff that makes up about 83 percent of the matter in the universe, but doesn’t interact with electromagnetic forces. Although the universe contains five times as much dark matter as normal matter, dark matter is completely invisible both to human eyes and every kind of telescope ever devised. Physicists only know it’s there because of its gravitational effect on normal matter. Dark matter keeps galaxies spinning quickly without flying apart and is responsible for much of the large-scale structure in the universe.

Current dark matter detectors are looking for WIMPs, or weakly interacting massive particles, that connect only with the weak nuclear force and gravity. Based on the most widely accepted theories, most experiments are tuned to look for a particle that is about 100 times more massive than a proton. The chief suspect is also its own antiparticle: Whenever a WIMP meets another WIMP, they annihilate each other.

“This is something that has always worried me,” said astroparticle physicist Subir Sarkar of the University of Oxford. If equal amounts of matter and antimatter were created in the big bang, the particles should have completely wiped each other out by now. “Obviously that did not happen, we are here to prove it,” he said. “So something created an asymmetry of matter over antimatter,” letting a little bit of matter survive after all the antimatter was gone.



Read More http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/07/dark-matter-sun/

[LiberalFighter]

1. Are there going to be a slew of Republicans dying such as Bush and Cheney family members???

yee hah

[Salviati]

2. George Bush doesn't care about dark matter...

:D

[Nihil]

3. Pardon my cynicism but this doesn't add up ...

> Dark matter is the mysterious stuff that makes up about 83 percent of
> the matter in the universe, but doesn’t interact with electromagnetic forces.

+

> “So something created an asymmetry of matter over antimatter,” letting
> a little bit of matter survive after all the antimatter was gone.

In what scheme of comparison can 83% be described as "a little bit"?
:wtf:

Oh, wait a minute, I think I'm getting it ...

> ... doesn’t interact with electromagnetic forces ...
> ... completely invisible both to human eyes and every kind of telescope
> ever devised ...

... yes ... it's coming through ...

> Physicists only know it’s there because of its gravitational effect on
> normal matter. Dark matter keeps galaxies spinning quickly without
> flying apart and is responsible for much of the large-scale structure
> in the universe.

... ahhh ... there it is ... it's "fiddle factor" mathematics - the kind
that keeps a time-worn yet inaccurate theory "working" despite mounting
evidence that it is wrong ... 83% is truly only "a little bit" when the
alternative is to admit that the Emperor's Robe is merely a codpiece!

:rofl:

[caraher]

4. a clarification

The "little bit" referred to in your quote is matter as opposed to antimatter, not dark matter as a fraction of all matter. These numbers are from memory and the correct values might both be larger by a few orders of magnitude, but the basic idea is that the very early universe had something like 300,000,000 particles of ordinary matter for every 299,999,999 particles of antimatter. At some point virtually all of the matter annihilated with antimatter, so for every 300,000,000 original particles of ordinary matter only 1 survived - a ratio I'm sure you'd agree is in some sense a "little bit" just as 83% is generally not considered "a little bit!"

That's not to say there isn't a lot of room for doubt when we literally do not know what most of the universe is made of, according to currently-prevailing theories!

[Nihil]

7. Gotcha!

Thanks for the clarification.

The way I read the OP, it was as if the matter/antimatter imbalance was
directly connected to the presence of dark matter (vs all matter).

:toast:

[HysteryDiagnosis]

8. But but but..... it just has got to be there cuz admitting the obvious

is strictly forbidden. Something I have said before and I'll say again:

The universe is composed of 23% dark matter, 72% dark energy and 100% doesn't matter.

[NickB79]

5. Photino birds!

Where are the Xeelee when you need them?

For reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeelee_Sequence_species

[FiveGoodMen]

6. First thing I thought of as well.