New Redshift-Scanning Technique Could Create Map of the Universe with 500 Times More Detail
The Cosmic Web of the Universe Nickolay Y. Gnedin, Nature, 435 (2 June 2005) It took mankind centuries to map the Earth, and even with all of the indexed knowledge in the world behind it Google can't always figure out exactly where the nearest Pinkberry is. So one might imagine how even with the amazing leaps in technology over past decades, mapping the universe is no small undertaking. But a new technique could allow cosmic cartographers to map 500 times as much of the universal landscape as they have thus far at a fraction of the cost. We don't know a whole lot about dark matter, outside of the fact that gravity suggests that it's there. But we do know that galaxies exist in a sort of dark matter web that runs throughout the universe. Using luminous galaxies as waypoints, astronomers have been able to map this cosmic web...