Parlyne
- 551
- 3
krash661 said:just so i understand,
are you saying it was a waste of time and resources and useless ?
Not at all. I'm just saying that the reporting of this result as evidence for dark matter is not a responsible representation of the data. I happen to think the AMS is an awesome experiment; and, I was actually quite excited when the shuttle mission was added in order to deliver it. Furthermore, I take no issues with the actual data or the work being done with it. And, as more data is collected, it may actually be able to help answer the question of the source of the positron excess - both by extending our knowledge about it to higher energy and by looking for directional dependence.
so the problem is finding the source of dark matter ?
No, it's finding the source of the excess positrons. It certainly could be that they come from dark matter annihilation; but, they could also come from astrophysical processes that nothing to do with dark matter.
" We already were confident that there is an unknown source of positrons above 10 GeV. ",
is this what you are referring to ?
it was followed with this comment,
" What we wanted to know from AMS was whether the effect continues at even higher energy, well above 100-200 GeV, and whether their more detailed observations would give us insight into whether this increase is due to a new astronomical effect or a new particle physics phenomenon. "
I'm not sure exactly what you're quoting; but, it seems to get at the basics of the issue.