Scientists detect possible dark matter signal deep underground: What you need to know

In a major breakthrough, scientists on a quest for dark matter have distinguished a subtle pattern from background noise during an experiment about a mile (1.6km) underground in South Dakota though they stopped short of claiming it was found.

The researchers' study of fundamental interaction at the Sanford Underground Research Facility built in a former gold mine in the state's Black Hills region, may involve a hypothesized particle called a WIMP.

Crucially, ordinary matter makes up stars, planets and everything else we can see. But this represents only about 15% of all the matter that exists inside the universe. The rest is considered to be dark matter which does not emit light and is invisible to the human eye and telescopes.

The lead author of this study, physicist Sam Eriksen described this work as the first hint of a dark matter observation.

What to know about dark matter

Researchers are currently searching for dark matter scattering off xenon atoms. Flashes of light can be observed when a particle scatters with the key properties of these flashes revealing what type of particle actually interacted with the xenon.

Nonetheless, scientists are unaware of the exact nature of dark matter, as uncertainties persist about the nature of the mysterious cosmic force called dark energy.

Study co-author Alvine Kamaha further explained: “When we observe galaxies and clusters ​of galaxies, we see that they behave as though they contain much more mass than the matter we can see. So, although we ​cannot see dark matter itself, ⁠we can observe what its gravity does

“We study its ⁠gravitational effects ​on galaxies and the universe. We try to produce dark matter particles in particle accelerators. And we perform direct ​detection using experiments buried deep underground, like LZ, to shield them from cosmic rays and other sources of background while we look for the extremely rare occasion when a dark matter particle interacts with ordinary matter, Kamaha continued.”