Milky Way has recent source-backed changes around Gamma-ray search sets new limits on dark matter annihilation in the inner Milky and Milky Way may have begun as thousands of galaxies, new simulations suggest.
Gamma-ray search sets new limits on dark matter annihilation in the inner Milky Way. Milky Way may have begun as thousands of galaxies, new simulations suggest.
Latest knowledge change
Dark matter could be a type of matter in the universe that does not emit, absorb or reflect detectable light and appears to interact very weakly with regular matter. Although physicists have observed gravitational effects attributed to dark matter, they have not yet been able to determine what it is made of.
In the early days of the universe, our home looked very different from how it does today. Back then, the region in our universe that would eventually become our Milky Way neighborhood was a collection of thousands of smaller galaxies—some pumping out tons of new stars, others filled only with gas or littered with dead.
A new study suggests that the young stars orbiting the Milky Way's central black hole may have a surprisingly ordinary origin. But the black hole's influence may be what makes their origin look more exotic than it really is. Along with shaping their orbits, it may also destroy their stellar companions. The paper outlin.
Nature, Published online: 12 August 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-02463-y Airborne camera gathers data about the high-energy particles emanating from the core of our Galaxy.
In the image above, a faint trail of stars can be seen stretching across the galaxy. These structures, known as globular cluster stellar streams, are coherent stellar structures that retain a record of their dynamical history and can provide unique insights into the evolution of galaxies and the nature of dark matter.