High resolution observations of dark matter?

AI Thread Summary
High-resolution observations of gravitational lensing by dark matter are limited, particularly at small scales, which remain poorly defined in the discussion. Current density maps indicate variations on scales larger than a galaxy, suggesting a lack of detailed insight into the clumping of dark matter. A recent documentary highlighted an image showing gravitational lensing effects that deviate from expected central mass distributions in galaxy clusters. This evidence hints at the complexity of dark matter's distribution but does not fully address the question of small-scale clumping. Overall, while some observations exist, they do not yet provide conclusive data on the small-scale structure of dark matter.
Martin Sallberg
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Are there any high resolution observations of the gravitational lensing by dark matter, good enough to determine if dark matter is clumped or spread out at small scales?
 
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Hard to know what you have in mind by "small scales". Density maps of DM that I've seen show variations on scales larger than the size of a galaxy.
 
I saw something on this in a recent documentary and I managed to find the photo they had shown.

Image: Composite Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/CfA/ M.Markevitch et al.;
Lensing Map: NASA/STScI; ESO WFI; Magellan/U.Arizona/ D.Clowe et al.
Optical: NASA/STScI; Magellan/U.Arizona/D.Clowe et al.

http://www.roe.ac.uk/~heymans/website_images/bulletcluster_comp_f2048.jpg

Found on:
http://www.cfhtlens.org/public/what-gravitational-lensing

The argument was that according to the calculated mass of the galaxy cluster, the gravitation lensing should be in the center but instead is shown on either side. Not exactly what you are looking for but the closest they have come so far to my knowledge.
 
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