DR. BASUDEB DASGUPTA

When we look at the night sky we see a variety of astronomical objects, e.g., planets, stars, gas clouds still waiting to form stars, etc., and swathes of emptiness. For a long time it was believed, this was all that was in the Universe. It came as a huge surprise that all this stuff we see and know comprises only about 20% of the matter in the Universe. The remaining 80% is invisible and called "Dark Matter." What is this dark matter? How did we learn that it's out there? Is it made of new undiscovered particles? Or something else? What are its properties? How can we decipher the nature of this mysterious new ingredient of the cosmic soup? In this talk we will address and answer some of these questions.