A Dark Matter Hunter’s Guide to the Universe
- Speaker
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Kathryn Zurek, Ph.D.California Institute of Technology
Presidential Lectures are a series of free public colloquia spotlighting groundbreaking research across four themes: neuroscience and autism science, physics, biology, and mathematics and computer science. These curated, high-level scientific talks feature leading scientists and mathematicians and are designed to foster discussion and drive discovery within the New York City research community. We invite those interested in these topics to join us for this weekly lecture series.
Dark matter is a new, mysterious form of matter that holds the universe together. It is responsible for the growth of structures in our universe as large as the Milky Way that can ultimately support life. While we know that dark matter is important for the evolution of our universe, and that it is much more prevalent than ordinary matter (such as electrons and nuclei), the underlying nature of dark matter remains unknown. Still, by using theoretical ideas exploring what dark matter may be, we can search for experimental evidence about its nature.
Kathryn Zurek will review evidence for the presence of dark matter in our universe and the need for a new theory to describe the dark matter sector. She will discuss how dark matter hunters are searching for dark matter through observations on galactic and extra-galactic scales, as well as in terrestrial experiments. She will focus on the connections among these various kinds of searches, from the cosmic microwave background to observations of high-energy gamma rays in our galaxy, as well as terrestrial experiments such as those involving the Large Hadron Collider.