New highly-detailed 3D map of universe with 6 million galaxies can unravel mysteries of dark matter

A highly detailed three-dimensional map of six million galaxies was recently unveiled by a group of scientists. The map is believed to have the potential to unravel some hidden secrets of dark matter and the future of our universe.

The map was created with the help of data collected by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) in Arizona. The first-of-its-kind map has scaled some galaxies for the first time that were never recorded earlier for the study of the universe.

DESI is an instrument that can capture light from 5,000 galaxies many million light years away from Earth. It becomes the backbone of research in the development of the biggest 3D map of galaxies that could alter the way we think about dark matter and the universe.

The unique feat was achieved by Universe DESI, a union of more than 900 researchers in institutions across the world.

One such researcher was Shadab Alam, the head of the Indian team at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, which also participated in the research. Shadab’s team published their research from the first year of observations by the DESI, which is mounted over the Mayall 4-Meter Telescope in the US.

Most-detailed map of the universe could unravel the hidden secrets of dark matter

Talking to WION, Shadab explains that we used to think that galaxies existed in a tightly-knit environment, but the new 3D map showed these galaxies running away from each other, which came as a surprise to the scientists.

“The further they [galaxies] are, the faster they are moving. This came as a big surprise because gravity is an attractive force and so we expected everything to be pulling together, not flying apart,” said Shadab.

Watch the full video here.

Understanding the universe in its truest form has always been of great interest and mystery to scientists all over the world. Whatever data that we have today, still fall short in explaining some of the greatest mysteries of the immensely-large cosmic space. The novel 3D map of some million galaxies is yet another attempt by humans to try and uncover some truths behind the ever-mesmerising universe.

Scientists involved in the research believe that this map could provide the first insights into the secrets of dark matter that is considered to make up almost 70 per cent of the universe but is still unknown.

The DESI collaboration has so far discovered that the expansion rate of the universe was rising by 68.5 km per second after every 3.26 million light-years of distance, a unit astronomers define as megaparsec.

Knowing about this expansion rate is a victory in itself, as per scientists. Now, this can be taken as a cue to further deep dive into the conundrum of dark matter.

(With inputs from agencies)