Scientists have determined that roughly 70% of the Universe is dark energy while Dark matter makes up about 25%. The normal matter or everything ever observed with all of our instruments adds up to less than 5% of the Universe.
The evidence for the existence of Dark matter comes from the detained analysis of the orbital motions of galaxies in galactic clusters.
In 1933 a Swiss astrophysicist Fritz Zwicky, of the California Institute of Technology applied Newton’s law of gravity to the Coma cluster of galaxies and obtained evidence of unseen mass. He estimated the cluster’s total mass based on the motions of galaxies near its edge and compared that estimate to one based on the number of galaxies and total brightness of the cluster. He found that there was about 400 times more estimated mass than was visually observable. The gravity of the visible galaxies in the cluster would be far too small for such fast orbits, so something extra was required. This is known as the “missing mass problem”. Based on these conclusions, Zwicky inferred that there must be some non-visible or dark form of matter which would provide enough of the mass and gravity to hold the cluster together.”
The fact that 70% of the universes energy is “dark” is determined by analyzing its spatial geometry.
(For those who are interested the video on the right gives a detail description of how its geometry determines the quantity of dark energy and matter it contains.)
At the present time we have some very good theories about the normal matter in the universe. The standard model of particle physical tells us what the particles are and how they interact in a manner that is consistent with all experimental observations. However the same cannot be said for dark matter because as of yet no one has observe any particles that could explain its properties.
However science has developed some theoretical models explaining its properties in terms of the existence of a non-baryonic form of particles such as neutrinos, and entities such as axions, supersymmetric particles, or WIMPs.
Yet, as Lee Smolin points out in his book “The Trouble with Physics” none of them are supported by observations.
Neutrinos because of their mass would be characterized by high random speeds in the early universe. However, observations of the early universe indicate the matter that condensed to form galaxies was not hot enough to support the energy that would be associated with those high speeds.
The other particles, which could provide the missing mass fall into two classes: those which have been proposed for other reasons but happen to solve the dark matter problem, and those which have been proposed specifically to provide the missing dark matter.
Examples of objects in the first class are axions and the supersymmetric particles. Their properties are defined by the theory, which predicts them, and by virtue of their mass; they can solve the dark matter problem only if they exist in the correct abundance.
The second class of particles contains entities such as the WIMP or “Weakly Interacting Mass Particle” whose properties are not specified. However, they are assumed to have properties that would allow them to explain the missing mass associated with dark matter along with other “ad hoc” ones that would explain why they have not yet been observed experimentally.
However, the existence of them along with axions and the supersymmetric particles is not based on observations so therefore there is no way to either confirm their existence or that they are responsible for the gravitational force associated with dark matter.
Yet it may be possible to understand what Dark Matter is if one assumes it is made up of a continuous field of mass because it will allow one to derive both its gravitational and quantum properties by extrapolating the laws of classical mechanics to the wave properties associated with particles.
Louis de Broglie was the first to theorize that all particles have the properties of waves. His theory was confirmed by the discovery of electron diffraction by crystals in 1927 by Davisson and Germer. .
However this observation allows one to explain as was done in the article Why is energy/mass quantized?†Oct. 4, 2007 how the continuous field properties of mass or dark matter become quantized and why we cannot directly observe it by extrapolating the laws of classical wave mechanics in to the properties of a continuous field.
Briefly it showed the four conditions required for resonance to occur in a classical environment, an object, or substance with a natural frequency, a forcing function at the same frequency as the natural frequency, the lack of a damping frequency and the ability for the substance to oscillate spatial would occur in in a a space-time environment
The existence of four dimensional space-time would give a wave in a continuous field of mass the ability to oscillate spatially on a “surface” of three dimensional space thereby fulfilling one of the requirements for classical resonance to occur.
These oscillations would be caused by an event such as the decay of a subatomic particle or the shifting of an electron in an atomic orbital. This would force the “surface” of a three-dimensional space manifold to oscillate spatially with the frequency associated with the energy of that event.
The oscillations caused by such an event would serve as forcing function allowing a resonant system or “structure” to be established space.
Therefore, these oscillations in a “surface” of a three-dimensional space manifold would meet the requirements mentioned above for the formation of a resonant system or “structure” in four-dimensional space if one extrapolated them to that environment.
Classical mechanics tells us the energy of a resonant system can only take on the discrete or quantized values associated with its fundamental or a harmonic of its fundamental frequency.
Hence, these resonant systems in four *spatial* dimensions would be responsible for the discrete quantized energy associated with the quantum mechanical systems.
However if dark matter and the gravitational forces it posses in made up of a continuous field of mass why is it that we cannot directly observe it.
There are at least two reasons for this. The first is because all observations require an exchange of energy between what is being observed and the observer. However as was shown above the most effective and efficient way for nature to transfer information to our instruments is, as was shown in the article “Why is energy/mass quantized?“ in a resonate system made up of the field properties of mass. Therefore in all measurements the particle properties associated with its resonant system will always be predominant over its field ones.
The second is that to directly measure a quantity there must be a physical difference between what is being measured and what is doing the measuring. For example one cannot measure the changing level of water in a ship lock from a ship in it by measure how high it is above the surface of the water ship is floating in because it is changing at the same rate.
Similarly one cannot measure the field properties of the mass component of space because the field properties in the measuring instrument are changing at the same rate.
However we can indirectly measure how the field properties of mass interact with particles as was shown by in 1927 by Davisson and Germer observation of electron diffraction by crystals.
In other words assuming Dark Matter is made up of a continuous field of mass not only explains why we cannot observe 25%.percent of the universe mass but also the Davisson and Germer discovery of electron diffraction by crystals in 1927 while at the same time deriving the quantum mechanical properties of particles in terms of the classical filed properties of space and time.
Later Jeff
Copyright Jeffrey O’Callaghan 2012