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Science 26 November 2004:
Vol. 306. no. 5701, pp. 1485 - 1488
DOI: 10.1126/science.1102823
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Perspectives

PHYSICS:
What Is Dark Matter Made Of?

Konstantin Zioutas, Dieter H. H. Hoffmann, Konrad Dennerl, Thomas Papaevangelou

Some 25% of the mass of the universe consists of dark (that is, nonluminous) matter. The nature of this dark matter remains unknown. In their Perspective, Zioutas et al. discuss attempts to detect neutralinos and axions, the two leading particle candidates for dark matter, in astrophysical studies. They show that astrophysical and cosmological observations, some of which have been overlooked in the past, can shed light on particle physics problems that are beyond the reach of accelerator experiments.

K. Zioutas is at the Physics Department, University of Thessaloniki, 52114 Thessaloniki, Greece, and at CERN, 1211 Geneva 23, Switzerland. D. H. H. Hoffmann is at the Institut für Kernphysik, TU-Darmstadt, Schlossgartenstr. 9, 64289 Darmstadt, Germany. K. Dennerl is at the Max-Planck-Institut für Extraterrestrische Physik, Giessenbachstraße, 85748 Garching, Germany. Th. Papaevangelou is at CERN, 1211 Geneva 23, Switzerland. E-mail: hoffmann{at}physik.tu-darmstadt.de

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)