Tantalising hints of dark matter — the mysterious substance thought to make up a quarter of the Universe — have been picked up for the first time, in an American laboratory buried half a mile underground.
Scientists working on the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS), in the disused Soudan iron ore mine in Minnesota, announced last night that they had detected two events with the signature of the weakly-interacting massive particles (WIMPs) that are thought to make up dark matter.
If the signals are confirmed by further observations that will begin next year, they would rank as one of the most important recent advances in physics and understanding of the cosmos.
The CDMS researchers stressed, however, that they were not claiming to have discovered dark matter because there is a good chance that the events were caused by something else.
