Slashdot Mirror
Mysterious X-ray Signal Hints At Dark Matter
Astronomers using the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the XMM-Newton have recorded an unusual emission of X-ray light from a remote cluster of galaxies which may turn out to be evidence of dark matter.
Astronomers think dark matter constitutes 85% of the matter in the Universe, but does not emit or absorb light like “normal” matter such as protons, neutrons and electrons that make up the familiar elements observed in planets, stars, and galaxies. Because of this, scientists must use indirect methods to search for clues about dark matter. he latest results from Chandra and XMM-Newton consist of an unidentified X-ray emission line, that is, a spike of intensity at a very specific wavelength of X-ray light. Astronomers detected this emission line in the Perseus galaxy cluster using both Chandra and XMM-Newton. They also found the line in a combined study of 73 other galaxy clusters with XMM-Newton. ... The authors suggest this emission line could be a signature from the decay of a "sterile neutrino." (Abstract.) Sterile neutrinos are a hypothetical type of neutrino that is predicted to interact with normal matter only via gravity. Some scientists have proposed that sterile neutrinos may at least partially explain dark matter.
Phlogiston, the luminiferous aether, the Rutherford atom, dark matter, dark energy, the Higgs field...
Maybe one day we'll explore the idea that the geometry of space-time isn't flat, and that most of our constants aren't.
If photons with a frequency in the visible spectrum don't react with "dark matter" than why would photons with a frequency in the xray spectrum?
Why do these crackpot-darkmatter-theories-du-jour all smell like mysticism?
Because you don't understand them, so you assume they must be hokum.