2016 AAAS Annual Meeting (February 11-15, 2016)

February 10 - 15, 2016

Where Did Most of the Universe Go? Searching for Dark Matter

Despite decades of research, starting in the 1930s, and the efforts of hundreds of cosmologists, astronomers, and physicists, we still know surprisingly little about the composition of the cosmos. While we now have a reasonably clear picture of “visible matter” – the building blocks of everyday objects – we also know this makes up just 5 percent of the universe. Where is the rest? One answer lies in the existence of another form of matter not visible using current methods and of unknown nature; as a result, dubbed “dark matter.” Current calculations suggest the universe contains more than 5 times more “dark” than ordinary matter, but we have no idea what it is, how it interacts with ordinary matter other than through gravity, or why it even exists. Add in the puzzle of “dark energy,” an unknown form of energy that continues to accelerate the universe’s expansion, and understanding “dark science” becomes the biggest challenge of modern physics and astronomy. This symposium provides an overview of dark matter, from the latest cosmological evidence of its existence to updates on the various theoretical and experimental methods now being used to “find” it -- as the first step toward understanding its properties, existence, and interaction with the visible universe.