Carnegie-Mellon University opens center for dark cosmology

Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania had established a cosmology center where multidisciplinary observational, theoretical, experimental, and computational efforts will focus on the elucidation of the dark matter and dark energy that are believed to dominate the cosmos and on their role in cosmic evolution. The Bruce and Astrid Williams Center for Cosmolgy , named after its major benefactors, was ceremonially opened on athe Carnegie-Mellon campus on 22 April. The day’s festivities included the 2008 Buhl Lecture, “A Brief History of Dark Matter,” by Joel Primack from the University of California, Santa Cruz. (more after the jump)Physicist to discuss history of dark matter in Buhl lecture.by Jocelyn Duffy (first appeared in the local university newspaper, the Piper)

Ninety-five percent of the universe is made of things that we know nearly nothing about — dark matter and dark energy. They are crucial to the growth of the universe and the formation of structure in it. But they cannot be seen, and the evidence of their existence comes from the gravitational pull dark matter exerts and the accelerating expansion of the universe that dark energy creates.

Evidence of dark matter was first found in the 1930s, but it took almost 50 years for most astronomers to become convinced that most of the mass holding together galaxies and clusters of galaxies is invisible. It took nearly another 20 years for the standard cosmology model to be accepted, with the “double dark” combination of cold dark matter — particles of matter different from the matter that makes up planets, stars, and even us — and dark energy.

One of the developers of the cold dark matter theory, Joel Primack, will present Carnegie Mellon’s annual Buhl Lecture at 4:30 p.m., April 22 in the Mellon Institute Auditorium. His talk, “A Brief History of Dark Matter,” will include astronomical videos that will give attendees a window into the evolution of the universe. “The challenge now is to understand the underlying physics of the particles that make up dark matter and the nature of dark energy,” Primack said.

Primack is a professor of physics at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He has recently chaired the APS Forum on Physics and Society, as well as the AAAS Committee of Science, Ethics and Religion. Primack served on the recent “Beyond Einstein” study of the National Academy of Sciences.

The Buhl Lecture is sponsored by Carnegie Mellon’s Department of Physics. The lecture is funded under the auspices of the Buhl Professorship in Theoretical Physics, which was established at Carnegie Mellon in 1961 by The Buhl Foundation. The lecture is free and open to the public.