NASA "To Announce new Dark Energy Findings"

[neilwilkes]

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2008/de ... lecon.html

NASA to Announce New Findings on Dark Energy


WASHINGTON -- Astronomers will hold a media teleconference Tuesday, Dec. 16 at 1 p.m. EST to announce important new results on dark energy that were made using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.

The briefing participants are:
-- Alexey Vikhlinin, astrophysicist, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, Mass.
-- William Forman, astrophysicist, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
-- David Spergel, theoretical astrophysicist, Princeton University

To participate in the teleconference, reporters must contact the Chandra press office at 617-496-7998 or via e-mail at mwatzke@cfa.harvard.edu before noon on Tuesday, Dec. 16, for dial-in information.

A video file about the discovery will air on NASA Television on Dec. 16. The teleconference audio will be streamed live on the Web at:

http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

Given there is no such thing as "Dark Energy", this could be amusing, sad or both.
I seriously doubt that they will admit to being wrong, and await this with interest.

[rcglinsk]

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2008/de ... lecon.html

NASA to Announce New Findings on Dark Energy


WASHINGTON -- Astronomers will hold a media teleconference Tuesday, Dec. 16 at 1 p.m. EST to announce important new results on dark energy that were made using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.

The briefing participants are:
-- Alexey Vikhlinin, astrophysicist, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, Mass.
-- William Forman, astrophysicist, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
-- David Spergel, theoretical astrophysicist, Princeton University

To participate in the teleconference, reporters must contact the Chandra press office at 617-496-7998 or via e-mail at mwatzke@cfa.harvard.edu before noon on Tuesday, Dec. 16, for dial-in information.

A video file about the discovery will air on NASA Television on Dec. 16. The teleconference audio will be streamed live on the Web at:

http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

Given there is no such thing as "Dark Energy", this could be amusing, sad or both.
I seriously doubt that they will admit to being wrong, and await this with interest.

Maybe they've figured out a way to power the telescope with dark energy.

[Tzunamii]

HEREis a link, highlighting the findings of the conference.
No scientists were available for comment, but Tweeky from Buck Rogers fame was quoted as saying:


"BEEDEE BEEDEE BEEDEE. Not impressed Buck."

More as this story developes.

[earls]

It was pretty underwhelming.

Basically their data indicates that SO FAR, Einstein was still right and General Relativity is the main player.

Seemed to indicate that vacuum energy is the best explanation of Dark Energy, and that even empty space has "weight" causing the expansion of space.

Ruled out the "Big Rip." Most structures that have already formed will maintain their structure for the foreseeable future.

However, while some alternative theories to Dark Energy are ruled out, some still remain such as Quintessence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintessence_(physics)

The next steps will be taken over the next 10 years as new instruments are launched and more data is collected.

[neilwilkes]

An update, it seems.
See http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chand ... 8-329.html
where it is being claimed that, er, "Dark Energy" is in fact the cosmological constant.
(From my point of view, I find it amusing how the "3 stages of the Universe" graphic shows the current state (pun unintentional) to be what we here would expect - filamentary & electrical - yet the description states:

The illustration on the right shows snapshots from a simulation by Volker Springel, representing the growth of cosmic structure when the Universe was 0.9 billion, 3.2 billion and 13.7 billion years old (now). This shows how the Universe has evolved from a smooth state to one containing a vast amount of structure. Gas is shown in these snapshots, where the yellow regions are stars and the brightest structures are galaxies and galaxy clusters. The growth of these structures was initially driven only by the attractive force of gravity, but then later there was competition with the repulsive force of dark energy.

Wonder where they took their "snapshots" of universal evolution from 0.9 & 3.2 billion years old from?