4 ms·

I think they buried the lede here! By combining the ability to determine dispersion in the signal path and now pinpointing the source, they recalculated the per

• burkaman 11y ago
  It is mind boggling, but it isn't new. The article is saying that these researchers were able to confirm the 5% estimate with a direct measurement. Here's a book from 2011 on the subject: http://www.amazon.com/The-Percent-Universe-Discover-Reality/dp/0547577575 http://www.amazon.com/The-Percent-Universe-Discover-Reality/...
• infogulch 11y ago
  I think you misunderstood. 95% of the universe is not-ordinary-matter, which is split between 70% dark energy and 25% dark matter. _This model has been widely held for years._ This same model suggests that there should be 5% ordinary matter, but until now we have only observed half of that 5%. This new FMB observation shows the full 5% for the first time, bringing our observed data to better alignment with the model.
• privong 11y ago
  > Dark matter makes up 95% of the universe now?!? The article was very poorly worded. As @infogulch noted, the 5% is of the total energy content of the universe, not the "matter" content. So that's been known. But what seems to be new is that of that 5% of normal (baryonic) matter, we've only been able to account for about half of it (stars, gas in galaxies). These FRB observations claim to have found evidence for the other half of the "missing baryons", likely in hot gas between galaxies.