A rare signal from the early universe sends scientists clues about dark matter
Using a deceptively simple antenna roughly the size and shape of a dinner table, radio astronomers have made an unprecedented discovery: telltale fingerprints from the earliest stars in the cosmos, pressed into the afterglow of the universe's birth.
That signal, imprinted more deeply into the Big Bang's afterglow than scientists expected, could reveal much about the universe's youth and hint at the nature of dark matter, that mysterious substance that far outweighs all the normal matter in existence.
The findings and the theoretical work describing dark matter's potential role, described in two papers in the journal Nature, excited theoretical and experimental physicists alike.
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