Astronomers have made a groundbreaking discovery using Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) to reveal the location of the universe’s missing ordinary matter. The baryons, or building blocks of matter, were once thought to be scattered across space but are now known to reside in specific regions.
Researchers used 69 FRBs, which originate from distant galaxies and travel through space at incredible speeds, to calculate their arrival time. By analyzing this delay, scientists have been able to “weigh” the diffuse intergalactic medium.
According to Dr. Vikram Ravi of Caltech, the technique is similar to observing a person’s shadow. “You may not see the person directly,” he explains, “but their outline tells you they’re there and how big they are.”
The study found that 76% of ordinary matter resides in the intergalactic medium, while 15% is located within galactic halos. The remaining 9% sits in stars or cold gas within galaxies.
This discovery confirms the standard cosmological model and opens up new avenues for research. Astronomers plan to use FRBs to measure the neutrino’s mass and chart dark filaments using the upcoming DSA-2000 telescope, which is expected to detect up to 10,000 FRBs per year.
Source: https://www.futura-sciences.com/en/the-universe-is-enormous-astronomers-have-finally-found-the-missing-matter-of-the-universe_18527