Descripción del proyecto
Determinar la naturaleza de la materia oscura a través de las corrientes estelares
La materia oscura nunca ha sido detectada, pero su existencia puede inferirse gracias a la atracción gravitacional que ejerce sobre estrellas y galaxias. Las corrientes estelares, restos de galaxias más pequeñas despedazadas por la fuerza gravitacional de la Vía Láctea, son especialmente susceptibles a los efectos de la materia oscura. El proyecto financiado con fondos europeos GREATDIGINTHESKY desarrollará técnicas de análisis que permitirán a los científicos combinar datos de todos los sondeos astronómicos pertinentes con las futuras publicaciones de datos de Gaia. El objetivo es identificar cien corrientes estelares galácticas a lo largo del proyecto. Estos estudios innovadores ayudarán a los científicos a corroborar las teorías de la gravedad y de la materia oscura, así como a evaluar la subestructura y distribución de la materia oscura en nuestra galaxia.
Objetivo
Why most of the matter in the Universe appears to be dark, and constituted of some unknown particles, is one of the most important open questions in physics today. Here we propose to investigate the relative merits of different possibilities for the nature of this dark matter, as well as alternative proposals for the nature of the gravitational interaction, by comparing their predictions to new high spatial resolution measurements of the 3D acceleration field in the Milky Way. These measurements will be achieved primarily by finding and analysing the many stellar streams that criss-cross our Galaxy. We have already built a stream-finding prototype that we have used with the Gaia mission’s second data release (DR2) to detect 13 new beautiful phase-space streams in the Milky Way. This project aims to develop analysis techniques that will allow us to combine data from all relevant sky surveys together with future Gaia releases to identify many other Galactic star streams. It is plausible that 100 or more streams may be identified by the end of our project. The conjoint analysis of these interwoven structures will provide us with the means to derive, for the very first time, the three-dimensional acceleration field on scales of 1-100 kpc. The streams will be used to probe the granularity of the dark matter distribution, testing whether their kinematics and sub-structure are consistent with interaction with the expected sub-halos of the standard Λ Cold Dark Matter (ΛCDM) paradigm. We will also simulate star streams in several alternative scenarios, including fuzzy dark matter, dipolar dark matter, superfluid dark matter, and modified Newtonian dynamics, and quantify their relative merits to simulations in ΛCDM. Together, these studies will test theories of gravity and dark matter theories, place the best constraints on the distribution of dark matter in our Galaxy, and probe the substructure of the dark matter, thereby setting the state of the art for the next decade.
Ámbito científico
Palabras clave
Programa(s)
Régimen de financiación
ERC-ADG - Advanced GrantInstitución de acogida
75794 Paris
Francia