Interstellar Traveler
By: Jessica Holmes @realtruthcactus
Earlier in July of 2023, the European Space Agency (ESA) launched the Euclid Space Telescope from the beaches of Cape Canaveral in the hopes of discovering clues about one of the universe’s greatest mysteries – dark matter.
Scientists hypothesize that 95% of our universe is comprised of this undetectable matter but what is it, exactly? Well, the thing is, we don’t really know. The 1990’s revealed to us one of the important entropic aspects of the second law of thermodynamics – that the universe is constantly expanding. Recognizing that there is only so much matter and energy contained within the universe, it was hypothesized that either the expansion would have to deccelerate over time or the universe would reach its expansion maximum and then proceed to collapse in on itself.
And yet, the a team of researchers called the High-Z Supernova Search discovered an incredible anomaly. As stars begin to decay and collapse within themselves, they will form a ‘white dwarf star’, the last phase of small but high density mass and energy a star will reach before it explodes as a supernova. Using these exploding stars as a standard, researchers could calculate their distances from the earth. The brighter the supernova, the closer the star is to earth. In theory, if the universe is deccelerating over time, the change in distance from the earth should also decrease over time. Yet, this is not what researchers found. In January of 1998, the American Astronomical Society held a press conference in Washington, DC to report findings that would forever change mankind’s perspective on the universe. The stars were not decellerating. They were, against all odds, accelerating in their expanse across the universe. Not only is the universe expansion accelerating, it is not predicted to stop anytime soon, if ever.
This was the first impetus for the question – how could this be? Over time, researchers continued to research the strange the gravitational warping of galaxies and the unexplainable acceleration of stars as they orbit galactic centers and discovered the substance we now refer to as “dark matter”. It is called “dark matter” because it does not interact with electromagnetic radiation (aka – light) in the same way that standard matter and energy do. Thus, it does not absorb, reflect, or emit light. So how is dark matter even detected? Well, this is the question. Some x-ray techniques, and experiments with the Large Hadron Colliderhardly have given us some insight into the possibilities of dark matter. Theories suggest that dark matter is made up of hypothetical particles called weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs), which is predicted to be anywhere between 10 to 100 times the mass of a proton. Or that perhaps dark matter is made up of axions, an infinitely small particle less than a billionth the size of the electron. Yet, at this point, all we have are hypotheses, theories, and questions, about an ocean of matter we cannot see, touch, or measure fully.
Hence, the voyage of Euclid. On July 31st, 2023 researchers received the first images from Euclid, revealing a host of dazzling stars and galaxies. The VISible (VIS) instrument has been used to take incredibly sharp images of the miraculous host of galaxies (Figure 1) with a clarity we have not seen before.
Similarly dazzling, but perhaps more striking are the images taken with Euclid’s Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer (NISP), which is used to collect information about the wavelengths of light emitted from each of the galaxies pictured (Figure 2).
With these new and fascinating images, researchers hope to map the distribution of galaxies across the universe and how that distribution changes over time. It is their hope that this three-dimensional map will give scientists more insights in the nature and behavior of dark matter and, perhaps, our entire existence. I, for one, welcome this venture into the unknown. What great discoveries might our interstellar traveler uncover about the creative and majestic nature of God? What wonders of creation will we find? This is one telescope we will be sure to keep an eye on.