This week in science: dark forces
When I was but a wee nerd and the Internet a tiny collection of DoD 3060s attached to a few university computer science departments via a pair of fine, twisted copper wires, my compadres and I were taught there were four fundamental forces in physics. Well, three really, actually two if we’re going to be super honest and all grandly unified about it, but four will also work. The number of fundamental forces tended to go down—and in physics, that’s considered a great thing—but what didn’t ever happen was the number of forces going up. Until now anyway:
As Feng points out, the four fundamental forces that physicists have known and studied for decades are: gravitation, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. But this new force has implications on one of the most elusive scientific concepts out there: dark matter.
The UCI researchers came to their conclusion after examining a 2015 study from researchers at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences who were looking for "dark photons," visible clues to the dark matter that is responsible for the majority of the universe's mass.
You’ve probably heard of Dark Matter and Dark Energy, which sound somewhat related since they’re both “dark”—even though they may have nothing to do with each other. But what’s so exciting here is the possibility that Dark Matter has force analogues to normal, baryonic matter. Because if it does, it might sort itself out into analogues of protons, or atoms, or molecules, and thus build into ever more complex structures. Could something like photino birds really be out there?
- Tomorrow on Sunday Kos I’ll be writing about a hypothetical new exoplanet orbiting a rather well-known, nearby star called Proxima Centauri.
- A NASA astronaut pens an op-ed in the New Yorker, let’s reward him by hitting this link:
As a scientist, I would like to think that the political discussion of climate change and how to mitigate its worst effects would be sober and fact-based. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Climate-change deniers in the United States have done a first-class job in spreading confusion and misinformation.
- I’m telling you—you better listen!—the Strong Robot Economy is coming folks, and here’s more evidence my wacky prediction might someday come to pass:
Say hello to Uber's self-driving car. The transportation startup and Volvo have agreed a $300 million alliance to develop autonomous vehicles — and they will be hitting the streets of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania this month.
- Enjoy the summer Olympics while you can:
According to the study published in the journal The Lancet, in seven decades (approximately by the year 2085), most of the cities will be too hot to host the Summer Olympic Games, and the world will only be left with eight cities outside Western Europe in the Northern Hemisphere.