
Vera Rubin has died - bryanrasmussen
https://carnegiescience.edu/news/vera-rubin-who-confirmed-%E2%80%9Cdark-matter%E2%80%9D-dies
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sulam
It's probably worth noting that the strongest proof of dark matter are
observations of the bullet galaxy, which Vera Rubin was not involved with as
far as I can tell. Some kinds of MOND (which tries to avoid the need for dark
matter to explain the current state of the universe) purports to be able to
explain Rubin's observations, although they cannot yet explain the bullet
galaxy.

I mention this because "confirmed" is a strong word for something that we
still have very little direct evidence for, other than observing the proper
motion of galaxies. That's pretty strong evidence, but it'd be really cool to
be able to detect the stuff directly.

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rubayeet
+1 for clarification. The LUX experiment in South Dakota has been unable to
find the evidence of Dark Matter.

[1] [https://www.wired.com/2015/12/dark-matter-still-super-
hard-t...](https://www.wired.com/2015/12/dark-matter-still-super-hard-to-
find/)

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Certhas
Ground based experiments are testing particular models of dark matter. We know
it (or some modification of gravity) exists due to its gravitational effects.
Direct detection could potentially rule out the modified gravity explanation,
and tell us more about what it is, but it appears disfavoured anyway (due to
bullet cluster et.al.).

The only models of modified gravity I know that are more than ad hoc
modifications of individual equations, and are actually complete theories,
introduce new fields anyway (e.g.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor%E2%80%93vector%E2%80%93...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor%E2%80%93vector%E2%80%93scalar_gravity)).

Additional matter appears to be an unavoidable consequence of her discovery.
What remains open is the type of matter.

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JoeDaDude
I was very surprised to hear this story carried on my local nightly news here
in Philadelphia. Seems she was a Philadelphia native at one point.

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webmaven
I am having difficulty reconciling "native" and "at one point". Do you mean
she was born in Philadelphia?

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seibelj
This comment is why I love hacker news. Pendantic, yet informative.

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radicality
Don't mean to be pedantic, but do you mean pedantic?

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webmaven
Pedanception!

