New Fast Radio Burst Discovery Finds 'Missing Matter' In the Universe (phys.org)

According to a study published today, an international team of scientists has for the first time managed to identify the location of a fast radio burst. FRBs are bright radio flashes that generally last for a few milliseconds. While their origin is unknown, the results are a missing distribution of matter in the universe. Now, using a combination of radio and optical telescopes, scientists have found the FRB. According to Benjamin Stappers, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Manchester, "Discovering more FRBs will allow us to do even more detailed studies of the missing matter and perhaps even study dark energy."

Comments

Re:I thought

[lgw]

First, kudos to the new /. owners for not linking a Forbes/startswithabang (fartswithabang?) article.

Dark matter and dark energy were the missing mass of the universe. Yawn.

Nope. The mass of the universe universe is 70% dark energy, 25% dark matter, 5% familiar matter. But only about half of that 5% can be accounted for by direct observation - the rest is "missing". TFA claims that the radio burst let researchers find a very dim (radio) galaxy that would not have otherwise been found - the matter is "missing" simply because you have to point a very good telescope at exactly the right part of the sky for a long time to find it.