The "Dark Matter Theory"

[Jeremy Buloch]

Dark Matter… It was predicted along time ago yet when the scientists aimed their telescopes and all their instruments at the stars and tried to find “Dark Matter” they found nothing. They only found the familiar chemical elements, which exists on Earth. Knowing this, scientists would find no surprises in space but the Superstring theory might change that… The process of fissioning from a ten-dimensional universe down to the much smaller universes probably made a new form of matter called “Dark Matter”. Dark Matter would have no properties known to science at this time. It would have no smell, no taste, no visible sign making it invisible making it a form of cloaking technology, but like all the matter in the universe it has weight. Anyone that touches “Dark Matter would feel its weight but not see it nor anything else. Even the most sensitive instruments can’t even detect its presence. The only way to detect “Dark Matter” is by its weight. It also has no known interaction with other forms of matter.

With “Dark Matter” many puzzles of cosmology might be explained yet only if there is sufficient matter in the universe then the gravitational attraction of all of the galaxies might slow down some of the galaxies expansion or it could reverse it. Making the Universe collapse. There is loads of conflicting data that says that there is enough matter in the universe to make it reverse then collapse. Astronomers have tried to find out if there is enough matter in the universe to make it collapse but don’t think that there is. The “missing mass” problem is because other calculations said that the universe might collapse when they calculate the luminosities of stars and the red shifts of Stars.

Superstring may be correct and if it is then that is why astronomers haven’t seen this form of matter in any of their sophisticated instruments. Also if The “Dark Matter” is correct then Dark Matter might be more than regular matter. So I come to the conclusion that if we were to use “Dark Matter” in the game then it would be a good form of cloaking technology. The only problem would be if it is possible in the real world to have this type of matter. Since this is a theory then it is yet to be proven false. We have to have the Superstring theory in order to have this “Dark Matter” to exist.

Since Dark matter is a theory we can use it because there isn’t anything that says its not real. So therefore I make this Idea: Put Dark matter on the hull of the ship and it will become invisible. I’m not sure if it would work. But it would make the ship invisible; yet making something invisible would make it only invisible so making it sort of like glass and the enemy would see the vessel. So any help on this subject would be greatly appreciated.
-J.B.-

[Gateway103]

Dark Matter don't necessarily need the Superstring Theory. Dark Matter is needed to explain certain observable phenomenon, such as the near-uniform angular velocity of stars about the galactic center for stars of all orbital radius.

Also, do not think "Dark Matter" refers only to strange exotic matter that do not emit nor reflect EM radiation, and do not interact with other matters except via gravity.

In fact, there are different candidates for "Dark Matter", some or all of which may make up for the apparent missing matter ("Dark Energy" is something entirely different, but that is outside of scope of this discussion).

1) Brown Drawf: basically failed star that never begin to shine. These are predicted to be quiet common actually, but since it doesn't shine, is very hard to detect

2) Neutrinos: Neutrinos don't interact very much. A single neutrino produced inside the sun can pass the Earth as if it were vaccum, without interacting once. They are very hard to detect when they pass through us, and currently we have no way to detect neutrinos out in space (i.e. we don't have a neutrino radar so to speak). Some types of neutrinos have been indirectly proven to have very very little mass, but there could be a lot of them out there.

3) Blackholes: they come in various masses. One theory I read before postulated jupiter mass blackhole in abundance (there are observational evidence supporting this, btw). And while in principal, hawking radiation from blackholes can be detected, they are in practise very hard. I'll not go into detail (will take too long), but in essence the observational difficulty has prevent us from knowing how many there may be, and how massive. (FYI, we know there may be a supermassic blackhole in our galactic center only indirectly through studying proper motion of nearby stars)

4) Exotic "matter": things with really strange properties (I said thing"S", may be several kinds). Here is where sci-fi and popular myth likes to tackle, need I say more?

Just my astronomy rambling.

-Gateway103

[Gateway103]

For a more precise and concise list of possible candidates for "Dark Matter"

Baryonic Matter (that is stuff made of protons and neutrons)
1) Jupiter size object (could be those blackholes or other object)
2) Brown Drawf, or very low mass stars
3) Black holes and stellar remnants (e.g. White Drawfs)

Non-baryonic Matter: (exotic matter)
1) Neutrinos with mass
2) WIMPS - Weakly Interacting Massive ParticleS, believed to have been created in the early universe. We are still looking for them.
3) Particles associated with symmetry breaking events: Little is known, exact what their effects are/were. An example of symmetry breaking event is that there are more matter than anti-matter in the universe (Asymmetric). A completely symmetric universe would have equal amount of both, which would be very bad for existence of molecules, let alone sentient life.

Current (AFAIK, as of 2001) estimation on the "matter" distribution of the universe:

67% "Dark Energy" <-- (a bad name in my opinion, but anyway)
30% "Dark Matter"
3% Ordinary Matter
(give or take a bit)

As my professor would say, these info are present just "for your cultural enrichment"

-Gateway103

[Leland]

I have the impression that dark matter/energy at the moment is just a placeholder for an explanation to the apparent problem of mass distribution in the universe... when and if we actually figure out what dark matter is, we wouldn't call it dark matter anymore. We'd call it whatever it turns out to be. That's why, I don't think that "dark matter" is a suitable concept for the game, let alone inspiration for materials or technology.

How it could be present is in background blurbs, at best. As in "The advances in blahblah have lead humanity to unlock the secrets of universe, thus explaining phenomena such as dark matter that used to baffle the 21st century scientists."

[targon]

Another stange thing: if "black matter" doesn't interact other than by gravity, it must collapse into black holes, because no force exists to stop it from doing that.

[Gateway103]

Targon, one of the analysis on "Dark Matter" distribution, in an attempt to solve the near-uniform angular velocity of stellar rotation about the galactic center, suggested something rather bizzare.

Bearing in mind that this analysis could be false or inaccurate, it suggested that these missing matter, while do gravitationally interact with normal baryonic matter, do not interact with itself gravitationally, or at least very weakly so.

One of the reasons that this is so is that if these missing matters do interact gravitationally with themselves, then their distribution in our galaxy must be similar to those of visible matter (since Gravity won't discriminate), but if so then the near-uniform angular velocity problem cannot be solved.

Weird stuff no? It suggests some of the missing matter are in the form of exotic, non-baryonic, "matter" or stuff, whose behaviour/property we aren't quiet sure yet.

-Gateway103

[Jeremy Buloch]

Ok I agree that Dark Matter might not be used for any technology in the game. I thought that if I bring it up there might be some use of it for the game. Like Background blurbs said by Leland. So it has inspired us to make something in the game. Thats pretty much why I started it. I figured it would be for something else. Besides Dark Matter wouldn't be able to be used in cloaking technology I looked up more information and came to a conclusion that it couldn't.
-J.B.-