Is This the Key to Unlocking the 80% of the Universe We Can’t See? | Columbia Close-Up скачать в хорошем качестве

Is This the Key to Unlocking the 80% of the Universe We Can’t See? | Columbia Close-Up

In this second episode of the Columbia Close-Up video series, we speak with Columbia University Professor Kerstin Perez (CC’05), who this month, along with collaborators, is flying a high-altitude balloon over Antarctica to search for dark matter. The Columbia-led experiment is called the General Antiparticle Spectrometer, or GAPS. The balloon will remain airborne, collecting data for about 30 days. Scientists can’t see dark matter, but they know that it’s everywhere, exerting a gravitational pull that causes stars and galaxies to cluster and clump into the structures that appear across the universe. But what exactly is dark matter—which makes up about 80% of the universe—made of? That’s what GAPS aims to discover. GAPS is the first experiment optimized specifically to identify low-energy anti-nuclei coming from outer space. Scientists have compelling theories for what dark matter could be. If those theories are correct, particles called anti-deuterons would be intermittently drizzling down on Earth’s upper atmosphere from space. With this experiment, they can test whether that’s happening, and, with their data, help clarify the nature of our universe.