Dark matter and dark energy comprise the vast majority of our universe, but it is the biggest mystery in modern physics to figure out what they actually are.
The five percent of matter we can perceive abides by the laws of physics as we understand them. But when scientists applied the laws of gravity to how fast nearby galaxies are rotation, the math didn’t add up. The other 95% of our universe is known only as dark matter and dark energy and scientists around the world are scrambling to understand what these two forces are.
»Who knows what discoveries and impacts on our lives will come» said Dr. Bruno Leibundgut, an astronomer at the European Southern Observatory, where he and his team are utilizing the most powerful telescope on Earth to figure out just how much the universe’s expansion is accelerating.
And in an abandoned gold mine a mile beneath the Black Hills of South Dakota, scientists are using a massive tank of supercooled liquid xenon as they wait for photosensors to measure an elusive dark matter particle.
Nuclear physicist and VICE correspondent Taylor Wilson went to meet the scientists working to solve the greatest mystery of the universe.
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