- #1
MattRob
- 208
- 29
WIMPs and "Ghost Planets"
There's very little known about WIMPs, from my understanding, but I believe there has been some speculation that they interact with each other less-than-weakly, and they most certainly do have a gravitational presence.
So, if WIMPs were to interact with each other in ways akin to how "light" matter particles interact with each other, wouldn't that imply that clouds of WIMPs would, much as regular matter in clouds of hydrogen and helium, condense under their gravity to form WIMP bodies (I would say "star", but that would be assuming WIMPs would undergo fusion with each other in such a configuration like light matter does)?
I just remember seeing some science news magazine speculating, based off of some published papers, on the possibility of WIMPs having their own series of interactions (strictly with other WIMPs) creating "dark-matter chemistry," but if they interacted in the same ways that normal matter does, then they'd form planets and stars.
But if they did that, then wouldn't the accretion of "light" matter into stars and planets accrete this dark matter as well, resulting in dark planets and stars?
(Imagine astronomers discovering that - a binary system where a 10-solar mass star orbits is red dwarf as though the red dwarf had 100 solar masses! All because the red dwarf accreted far more dark matter than light, resulting in a much greater gravitational presence than the other star. Or even a binary system - one star light, the other star dark, so that it appears a star orbits empty space!)
There's very little known about WIMPs, from my understanding, but I believe there has been some speculation that they interact with each other less-than-weakly, and they most certainly do have a gravitational presence.
So, if WIMPs were to interact with each other in ways akin to how "light" matter particles interact with each other, wouldn't that imply that clouds of WIMPs would, much as regular matter in clouds of hydrogen and helium, condense under their gravity to form WIMP bodies (I would say "star", but that would be assuming WIMPs would undergo fusion with each other in such a configuration like light matter does)?
I just remember seeing some science news magazine speculating, based off of some published papers, on the possibility of WIMPs having their own series of interactions (strictly with other WIMPs) creating "dark-matter chemistry," but if they interacted in the same ways that normal matter does, then they'd form planets and stars.
But if they did that, then wouldn't the accretion of "light" matter into stars and planets accrete this dark matter as well, resulting in dark planets and stars?
(Imagine astronomers discovering that - a binary system where a 10-solar mass star orbits is red dwarf as though the red dwarf had 100 solar masses! All because the red dwarf accreted far more dark matter than light, resulting in a much greater gravitational presence than the other star. Or even a binary system - one star light, the other star dark, so that it appears a star orbits empty space!)