Potential First Detection of Dark Matter Reported by Astronomers
Astronomers have announced a potential first-time detection of dark matter, based on an analysis of fifteen years of data from NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. The research focuses on a previously overlooked region near the centre of the Milky Way galaxy.
The team,led by Professor Toshitaka Totani,identified a halo of gamma rays with a photon energy of 20 gigaelectronvolts (20 billion electronvolts) that couldn’t be attributed to any known source. This emission closely aligns with the shape predicted for a dark matter halo.
the prevailing theory suggests dark matter is composed of particles called WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles). These particles,like ordinary matter,are expected to have antimatter counterparts. When WIMPs and anti-WIMPs collide, they should annihilate each other, releasing energy in the form of gamma rays. Detecting these gamma rays has been a long-standing goal for scientists.
The intensity of the detected gamma-ray emissions corresponds with predictions based on the annihilation of WIMPs with a mass approximately 500 times that of a proton. “We detected gamma rays…extending in a halolike structure toward the center of the Milky Way galaxy,” Totani stated. “The gamma-ray emission component closely matches the shape expected from the dark matter halo.”
Totani believes this discovery represents a important advancement in both astronomy and physics, stating, “It turns out that dark matter is a new particle not included in the current standard model of particle physics.”
Though, the findings are met with some skepticism within the scientific community. Kinwah Wu, a theoretical astrophysicist at University College London, cautioned, “I appreciate the author’s hard work and dedication, but we need extraordinary evidence for an extraordinary claim. This analysis has not reached this status yet. It is a piece of work which serves as an encouragement for the workers in the field to keep on pressing.”
Totani acknowledges the need for further confirmation. He suggests that detecting a similar gamma-ray signature in small dwarf galaxies orbiting the Milky Way would provide stronger evidence supporting the claim. He anticipates this might potentially be possible with the accumulation of more data.
