Cosmic background radiation is the “little heat” left by the Big Bang (Photo: NASA)
1. COSMIC BACKGROUND RADIATION
It is the “little heat” left by the Big Bang and which makes it possible to specify the age of the Universe in 13.7 billion years. It was discovered experimentally in 1965 by Arno Penzias and Robert Woodrow Wilson, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1978.
Decades later, Canadian James Peebles was able to interpret this radiation further to draw current conclusions about the makeup of the cosmos, which also earned him a Nobel Prize in Physics in 2019.
2. MATERIAL
It is anything that occupies space and has mass or, in physical terms, an aggregation of particles that have mass. Only 5% of the Universe is made up of matter as we know it.
3. BLACK MATERIAL
About 25% of the cosmos is made up of something invisible that does not emit light and only interacts gravitational, causing effects on visible matter.
4. BLACK ENERGY
The other roughly 70% of the Universe is filled with a form of energy that tends to accelerate universal expansion, as opposed to gravity.
5. GRAVITATIONAL LENSES
Gravitational lenses: optical phenomenon allowing to deduce the existence of dark matter (Photo: ESA / Hubble / NASA)
It is an optical phenomenon that allows us to infer the existence of dark matter. This happens when a massive body (i.e. one that generates a high gravitational force) between a star and the observer deforms space-time. If the object is fully aligned with the center of the lens and the viewer, it forms a ring around the center of mass of the lens.
6. GROUP OF GALAXIES
Observing the level of agglomeration of galaxies is another way to infer the existence of dark matter (and, in this case, energy as well). If there is a lot of dark matter, the tendency is for galaxies to clump together, due to the force of gravity. If there is a lot of dark energy, they are likely to move away, due to the accelerating force of the expansion of the Universe.
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