In addition to giving us stunning images of our universe, the Hubble telescope could help us solve one of the greatest mysteries of the cosmos: the dark matter. According to a new idea proposed in a recent study, dark matter could be composed of ultralight dark photons.
Dark matter remains for now one of the unsolved mysteries of astronomy, but scientists have developed a hypothesis that is in perfect agreement with the data collected by Cosmic Origin Spectrograph (COS), aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. It is an instrument capable of making measurements on the “cosmic network“, a complex conglomeration of filaments that fills the space between galaxies.
The data collected by the tool suggests that these cosmic filaments are hotter than expected. According to scientists, dark photons would be able to convert into low-frequency photons, heating up cosmic structures and thus giving an explanation to the phenomenon.
Dark photons might be what makes up dark matter, but what exactly are they? “Dark photons are hypothetical particles, force carriers in the dark sector, just like normal photons are force carriers in electromagnetism,” explained the study authors.
“Unlike photons, however, they can have mass. In particular the ultralight dark photon – with a much smaller mass than the electron – is a good candidate for dark matter.”
Scientists – who have studied the redshift of cosmic filaments – have discovered that to explain their heating it is necessary to take into account the effects produced by dark photons.
This study could be the first step towards new research on dark matter and the exciting possibility that it could be formed by dark photons.
