Exploring Dark Energy Through Distant Galaxy Alignments: A Confirmation of Einstein's Theories

 Einstein's gravitational theories have been reaffirmed through a groundbreaking investigation of distant galaxy alignments, which also reveals their potential as dark matter and dark energy trackers on a large scale. An international research team collected data from 1.2 million galaxies located tens of millions of light years away, proving that their cosmic-scale distribution is influenced by dark matter's gravitational effects, consistent with Einstein's general relativity.

The researchers analyzed the positions and orientations of these galaxies using data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey. By examining the three-dimensional positions and galaxy shapes, they measured intrinsic alignment relative to distant neighbors.

The study's lead author, Teppei Okumura, said that they were able to determine the extent of galaxy orientation alignment and measure the rate at which galaxy distribution becomes denser due to gravity, which aligns with general relativity theory. Furthermore, this research marks the first time cosmological constraints on the universe's expansion have been established through galaxies observed by the SDSS. The results showed a 19% increase in the expansion rate constraint when compared to constraints that don't consider intrinsic alignments between galaxies.

The researchers believe that the contribution of intrinsic alignment statistics can be further enhanced by adopting an ideal weighting for brighter galaxies. Although this study is just the first step in exploring dark matter and dark energy in the universe, it holds great promise. The team is now working on a new paper to demonstrate improvement by incorporating other crucial elements like baryonic acoustic oscillations (BAOs) observed in galaxy distributions.

This study was published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, and the research was conducted by Kyoto University.

Source: The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Kyoto University

KyotoU/Jake Tobiyama