Eureka! Mysterious Dark Matter Particles Identified By Supercomputer

Are we a step closer to finally finding the mysterious dark matter? A German-Hungarian team of researchers led by Professor Zoltán Fodor of the University of Wuppertal, Eötvös University in Budapest and Forschungszentrum Jülich predicted the mass of the so called axions --- theoretical particles that make up dark matter --- to work out the mystery behind the invisible matter.

It has long been thought that more than half of the universe's mass consists of dark matter. This hypothetical substance makes the universe balanced. Despite this however, proving its existence remains a challenge. The answer to the question, what is dark matter made of remains an enigmatic challenge.

"Dark matter is an invisible form of matter which until now has only revealed itself through its gravitational effects. What it consists of remains a complete mystery," explains co-author Dr Andreas Ringwald, who is based at DESY and who proposed the current research, in a press release.

According to IB Times, there are currently two main theories about the composition of dark matter: It is made of a few but very heavy particles, or lots of extremely light ones.

Space.com notes that scientists have been looking to find ways to prove the first theory, but so far they have come up with nothing. Thus, now, they are testing the second theory.

The team believes that the search for axions (very light particles) could lead them closer to pinning down the elusive dark matter.

"... to find this kind of evidence it would be extremely helpful to know what kind of mass we are looking for," emphasises theoretical physicist Ringwald. "Otherwise the search could take decades, because one would have to scan far too large a range."

Using a supercomputer named JUQUEEN (BlueGene/Q), the team were able to determine the mass of axions. Results show that axions have a mass between 50 and 1,500 micro electronvolts, which is about 10 billion times lighter than an electron, Inverse noted.

The number obtained makes these hypothetical particles far heavier than previously thought which could be bad news for experiments trying to hunt for axions in light.

Meanwhile, if the estimates of the researchers are correct, scientists should be able to figure out whether axions actually exist within the next few years.

The results of the study were published in Nature.