Exploring dark matter through the curvature of space-time
by
Leon Koopman(Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, Groningen)
→
Europe/Stockholm
FA32
FA32
Description
Dark matter is thought to compose most of the gravitating mass of the Universe, even though
it has never directly been detected and its properties remain ill understood. Gravitational lensing, i.e.
the (apparent) bending of light caused by curved-space time, provides a unique way to make the
distribution of dark-matter structure visible in the Universe, even cases where no radiation-emitting baryons are
present in these structures. I will present a number of very recent and exciting results that shed light on
the distribution of dark matter in and around galaxies and shortly discus the consequences
of our findings for the understanding of the properties of dark matter.
