Dark-energy fingerprints found in ancient radiation

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Only cat burglars can match the stealth of http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19325911.700-dark-energy-seeking-the-heart-of-darkness.html">dark energy, credited with speeding up the universe's expansion over time, but now its fingerprints have been glimpsed in the universe's oldest radiation.

The http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20928054.900-dark-energy-is-not-an-illusion-after-all.html">strongest evidence for dark energy comes from supernovae, which suggest the universe is expanding faster now than in the past. But the force should also change the extent to which the http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19887-microwave-radiation-map-hints-at-other-universes.html">cosmic microwave background (CMB), relic radiation from the big bang, is warped, or "lensed", by the gravity from distant galaxies and dark matter.

That's because the accelerating expansion of the universe should prevent the growth of very massive structures. "In a universe with no dark energy, massive objects would just keep growing, which results in more gravitational lensing," says http://bccp.lbl.gov/~sudeep/home.html">Sudeep Das of the University of California, Berkeley.

Gravitational lensing is tough to pick out in the ancient radiation because the CMB contains random fluctuations. But Das and his colleagues have used a new type of mathematical analysis to reveal for the first time the distinctive distortions from gravitational lensing in the CMB

Much more at link: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20702-darkenergy-fingerprints-found-in-ancient-radiation.html