01/11/2026
Happy Dark Matter Day! ✨
Today, October 31, we celebrate the search for one of the Universe's greatest mysteries: dark matter!
We know dark matter exists because of its gravitational effects, but we still don't know what it's made of. How can we find out more about it and could we detect it directly?
At IAC3, researchers are investigating how gravitational-wave detectors and observations can help uncover the nature of dark matter.
A recent study co-authored by Ornella Juliana Piccinni investigates new ways to improve searches for ultralight dark matter using ground-based gravitational-wave detectors, focusing on its possible interactions with ordinary matter.
Another study by Samuel Gómez Gómez, Xisco Jiménez Forteza and Carlos Palenzuela Luque examines how hypothetical ultralight particles could influence gravitational-wave signals from black holes, potentially opening new opportunities for future observations with LISA.
There is still much to discover!
Read more:
- Delgado, Piccinni & Urban (submitted to JCAP): arXiv:2606.09210
- Gómez Gómez, Jiménez Forteza & Palenzuela (accepted in Physical Review D): arXiv:2605.17589
Image credit: Ralf Kaehler/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, American Museum of Natural History.
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