If This Type of Dark Matter Existed, People Would Be Dying of Unexplained Wounds
Dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up most of the mass of the universe, has proved notoriously hard to detect. But scientists have now proposed a surprising new sensor: human flesh. The idea boils down to this: If a certain type of dark matter particle existed, it would occasionally kill people, passing through them like a bullet. Because no one has died from unexplained gunshot-like wounds, this type of dark matter does not exist, according to a new study... [It's title? "Death by Dark Matter."]
This experiment doesn't rule out heavy macro dark matter altogether, says Robert Scherrer, a co-author and theoretical physicist at Vanderbilt University. It merely eliminates a certain range of them. Heavier macro dark matter would not occur frequently enough to measure, notes Katherine Freese, a theoretical physicist at the University of Michigan, and other forms wouldn't kill people. "There is probably still room for very heavy dark matter," says Paolo Gorla, a particle physicist at Italy's underground Gran Sasso National Laboratory, who is not involved with the study.
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Dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up most of the mass of the universe, has proved notoriously hard to detect. But scientists have now proposed a surprising new sensor: human flesh. The idea boils down to this: If a certain type of dark matter particle existed, it would occasionally kill people, passing through them like a bullet. Because no one has died from unexplained gunshot-like wounds, this type of dark matter does not exist, according to a new study... [It's title? "Death by Dark Matter."]
This experiment doesn't rule out heavy macro dark matter altogether, says Robert Scherrer, a co-author and theoretical physicist at Vanderbilt University. It merely eliminates a certain range of them. Heavier macro dark matter would not occur frequently enough to measure, notes Katherine Freese, a theoretical physicist at the University of Michigan, and other forms wouldn't kill people. "There is probably still room for very heavy dark matter," says Paolo Gorla, a particle physicist at Italy's underground Gran Sasso National Laboratory, who is not involved with the study.
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