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Missing Matter... Still Missing
squidfrog writes "Nature.com, PhysicsWeb, and the BBC all report on the latest results from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search. 'The most powerful search yet for the Universe's missing matter has come up empty handed, contradicting an earlier study that claimed to have seen new particles.' 'A favoured theory is that the dark matter consists of Wimps (weakly interacting massive particles) about a thousand times more massive than a proton, one of the particles found in an atom's nucleus... on the rare occasions a Wimp strikes an ordinary atom, the effect should be noticeable.' 'Writing in the Physical Review Letters, the team says that while a detection has yet to occur, there is now a better idea of how much dark matter must exist.' They 'hope to improve the sensitivity of the experiment by another factor of 20 over the next few years.' What's 20 times 0? And don't tell me zero!"
Anyone in high school knows that if a wimp hits anything, no one notices. If someone did notice, he wouldn't be a wimp.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
If a Wimp is about a thousand times more massive than a proton - what does that make a proton? a Wuss? or a Nerd?
- Your stupidity got you into this mess, why can't it get you out? -Will Rogers
The real dark matter in the universe is the massive SCO intellectual property rights that no one else has yet seen.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Zero.
Opps. I meant, seven.
All they have to do is reverse the polarity of the anti-proton injectors in the warp core, re-route the resulting subspace pulse through the plasma conduits, synchronise the comm-system to transmit the frequency of the subspace distortion field to the deflector dish and emit a sub-tachyon particle scan over a wide area. That'd surely reveal what they're looking for!
Drill baby drill - on Mars
> How could a wimp be so large and yet unnoticed?
You just described my entire high school career.
The detector is also chilled to within a tenth of a degree of absolute zero [...]
How do they do it?
Ever been to Minnesota? In the winter? You wouldn't have to ask.
The one page write up doesn't describe how they know the detector works, but I'm sure they have _some_ means of testing that it does.
Sure they do... the system has a green light on. If the red light were on it would be on standby and no light may mean there is no power, or the light is broken. But as long s the green light is on they know it's working.
Surely everyone knows that. Now please increase my grant.
I'd just like to be the first to say that it's an honor, Mister President, to count you amongst the Slashdot readership.