Space presents a problem. 90% of the Universe is actually invincible and this mysterious missing stuff is known as ‘dark matter’.

The problem was first identified when astronomers tried to weigh galaxies. There are two methods to do this. You can tell how much a galaxy weighs by looking at how bright it is and then converting this into mass or,  you can look at the way stars move. Everything in the Universe rotates. Studying how fast stars at the edge move reveals the mass of the whole galaxy. The faster the galaxy rotates, the more mass there is inside it.

A discrepancy arose in the 1930’s when two scientists weighed galaxies and found that the two sets of answers didn’t match. These were tried and tested methods of measuring and they were forced to come to the conclusion that there must be invincible ‘stuff’ out there. This ‘stuff’ aptly named dark matter for its shroud of mystery, is really important as it keeps galaxies from flying apart as they spin.

Astronomers are busy working on solving the Mystery of the Missing Matter. Words like MACHOs, WIMPSs, neutrinos, dark energy and superstring theory are popping up. But the case is far from being solved.

All we know at this stage is that it’s anything but “Elementary, my dear Watson”…