直接探测银河系暗物质
摘要
银河系包含一个大型的球状成分，被认为含有相当大的不可见物质。最近的观察间接地表明，最多有一半这种“暗物质”可能以非常古老、非常缓热的白矮星形式出现，这些矮星是来自与银河系本身年龄相当的古老星族的残余。我们进行了一个调查，寻找带有大空间速度的暗淡、缓热的白矮星，以表明其成员属于银河系球状成分。该调查发现了一个相当大的、直接观察到的古老白矮星 population，这些矮星太淡，以前的调查无法看到。这一新发现的 population 至少占据暗物质 halo 份额的2%。这为间接观察提供了自然解释，并代表了银河系暗物质的直接探测。
引用
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0104293,
title = {Direct Detection of Galactic Halo Dark Matter},
author = {B. R. Oppenheimer and N. C. Hambly and A. P. Digby and S. T. Hodgkin and D. Saumon},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0104293},
year = {2009}
}
备注
13 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. Note added after Science Express online publication: This text reflects the correction of a few typographical errors in the online version of the table. It also includes the new constraint on the calculation of d_max which accounts for the fact that the survey could not have detected stars with proper motions below 0.33 arcseconds per year. Published online at ScienceExpress www.sciencemag.org 22 March 2001; 10.1126/science.1059954; To appear in Science 27 April 2001