CDAA

General Information

These reports appear in the last Thursday of the month (before our monthly meeting held on the first Thursday of the month) editions of the 'Clacton Gazzette' and 'Essex Evening Standard' in their 'Neighbourhood News' sections

Dark Matter - Proof at Last? by Mike Haynes

In the first meeting of the New Year held on 5th January 2012, a new member Mike Haynes gave an ambitious presentation on the subject of Dark Matter. In a well prepared and enlightening talk he began with the history. It had been realised in the early 1930’s that all was not well with the Universe. There was a discrepancy between the visible mass of the Universe and the gravitational influence of that mass. An increasing number of observations were implying that there was more mass in the Universe than what was observed. A ground breaking multiple observation of colliding galaxy clusters revealed that this additional mass was not ‘normal’ matter. Just what that matter actually is has been a hot subject of debate for many years. Having laid the groundwork, Mike concluded the presentation with a discussion of possible constituents of this Dark Matter.