One crucial component of our current understanding of galaxies and cosmology is that most of the matter in the Universe is in the form of dark matter--an as-yet-unidentified form of matter that appears to neither give off nor interact with light. In this talk, Professor Bell will describe what we have learned about the distribution of dark matter around galaxies by studying stars in the sparsely-populated distant outskirts of galaxies, well outside where one would expect to find stars.
This event is presented by the University Lowbrow Astronomers and is an official event of the MSU Science Festival's Statewide Astronomy Night.