Skip to main content

Really *BIG* particles?

Boomerang CMB plot

A New Scientist article called (of all things!) Globs In Space — and which, sadly isn’t on-line to read as I type this — postulates CDM [Cold/Dark Matter] particles, each particle as big as a galaxy.

They’re not very dense compared with ordinary matter, but they’re an attempt to bring what we see in line with what we expect.

Thankfully, science is socially variable. As this attempt to invent such galactically-obscure objects trundles along, other scientists are preparing to drive the Pioneer satellites around to check our understanding of how gravity works, and still others are marvelling that the CMB [Cosmic Microwave Background] Radiation so far seen really doesn’t match any reasonable form of Big Bang (or any recognised Dark Matter theories), and are trying to figure out why not.

So... objects as different as a few tonnes of comet or asteroid versus collections of bazillion-tonne whole galaxies are all coming under the research glasses.

The results should be interesting: on one hand, the CMB (and the like) missions didn’t provide the results that they were sent up expecting to find — but on the up-side, genuine real science (-: and probably some butte-covering, too :-) is still getting done with what they really observed.

Hurrah for diversity! And for Open-Source-style-ish science results!

Comments

Leon RJ Brooks said…
Interestingly, one of the experiments which shows the CMB results mismatching is called BOOMerang even though it's not Australian.

Popular posts from this blog

new life for an old (FTX) PSU, improved life for one human

the LEDs on this 5m strip happen to emit light centred on a red that does unexpectedly helpful things to (and surprisingly deeply within) a human routinely exposed to it. it has been soldered to a Molex connector, plugged into a TFX power supply from a (retired: the MoBo is cactus) Small Form Factor PC, the assorted PSU connectors (and loose end from the strip) have been taped over. the LED strip cost $10.24 including postage, the rest cost $0, the PSU is running at 12½% of capacity, consumes less power than a laptop plug-pack despite running a fan. trial runs begin today.

every-application-is-part-of-a-toolkit at work

I have a LibreOffice Impress slideshow that I wish to turn into a narrated video. 1. export the slideshow as PNG images (if that is partially broken — as at now — at higher resolutions, Export Directly as PDF then use ‘pdftoppm’ (from the poppler-utils package) to do the same). 2. write a small C program (63 lines including comments) to display those images one at a time, writing a config file entry for Imagination (default transition: ‘cross fade’) based on when the image-viewer application (‘display,’ from the GraphicsMagick suite) is closed on each one; run that, read each image aloud, then close each image in turn. 3. run ‘Imagination’ over the config file to produce a silent MP4 video with the correct timings. 4. run ‘Audacity’ to record speech while using ‘SMPlayer’ to display the silent video, then export that recording as a WAV file. 4a. optionally, use ‘TiMIDIty’ to convert a non-copyright-encumbered MIDI tune to WAV, then import that and blend it with the speech (as a quiet b...

boundaries

pushing the actual boundaries of the physical (not extremes, the boundaries themselves) can often remove barriers not otherwise perceived. one can then often resolve an issue itself, rather than merely stonewalling at the physical consequences of the issue.