Unveiling the nature of dark matter with small-scale cosmic structure

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• Risa Wechsler (Stanford/KIPAC)
• Thursday 19 June 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Hoyle Lecture Theatre, Institute of Astronomy (and online - details to be sent by e-mail).

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Steven Brereton.

Cosmological and astrophysical observations provide clear evidence for the existence of dark matter and have begun to map its distribution across vast cosmic volumes, yet key questions about its mass and interaction properties remain unanswered. Clues may lie in measurements that probe structure formation on the smallest scales—including dwarf galaxies, strong gravitational lenses, and stellar streams. These observations are already constraining aspects of the microphysical nature of dark matter, including its free-streaming behavior, decay lifetime, self-interactions, and possible interactions with the Standard Model. The upcoming generation of wide-field imaging surveys—including Euclid, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, and the Roman Space Telescope—combined with spectroscopic surveys such as DESI and the new Via Project, will accelerate our ability to probe this physics. These efforts may detect, for the first time, dark matter halos below the threshold for star formation, directly testing a fundamental prediction of the standard cosmological model and offering the possibility of uncovering definitive astrophysical signatures of dark matter’s particle properties.

This talk is part of the The Kavli Lectures series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• Cambridge Astronomy Talks
• Combined External Astrophysics Talks DAMTP
• Cosmology lists
• Cosmology, Astrophysics and General Relativity
• Hoyle Lecture Theatre, Institute of Astronomy (and online - details to be sent by e-mail)
• Institute of Astronomy Colloquia
• Institute of Astronomy Talk Lists
• Kavli Institute for Cosmology Talk Lists
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