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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

The Experiment to Detect Global EoR Signature [wikipedia.org] (EDGES) has found evidence of the universe's first stars [latimes.com] by detecting an absorption feature at 78 MHz (redshifted from 1.42 GHz [wikipedia.org]). In a second paper, the astronomers say that "this absorption can be explained by the combination of radiation from the first stars and excess cooling of the cosmic gas induced by its interaction with dark matter":

Using a deceptively simple antenna roughly the size and shape of a dinner table, radio astronomers have made an unprecedented discovery: telltale fingerprints from the earliest stars in the cosmos, pressed into the afterglow of the universe's birth. That signal, imprinted more deeply into the Big Bang's afterglow than scientists expected, could reveal much about the universe's youth and hint at the nature of dark matter, that mysterious substance that far outweighs all the normal matter in existence.

The findings [nature.com] [DOI: 10.1038/nature25792] [DX [doi.org]] and the theoretical work [nature.com] [DOI: 10.1038/nature25791] [DX [doi.org]] describing dark matter's potential role, described in two papers in the journal Nature, excited theoretical and experimental physicists alike.

"To my mind ... it's Nobel Prize-worthy twice, if it's real," said Avi Loeb, a Harvard University theoretical astrophysicist who was not involved in the research. "Not only did they detect the signal, but it actually is bigger than one can accommodate in the standard cosmological model. And you need new physics in order to explain a signal as big as they detected."

The first (short-lived) stars formed around 180 million years after the Big Bang.

Also at Ars Technica [arstechnica.com], Sky & Telescope [skyandtelescope.com], and The Verge [theverge.com].

Original Submission