Why doesn't the universe's most abundant matter collapse into black holes?
In short: Dark matter outweighs all normal matter in the universe, yet it refuses to clump into stars or black holes. This video explores the physical mystery of why this invisible substance remains in fuzzy clouds rather than collapsing under its own gravity.
While normal matter collapses under gravity to form planets, stars, and black holes, dark matter behaves differently. Despite its massive presence, it remains distributed in enormous, diffuse clouds around galaxies. This discrepancy raises a fundamental question about the nature of dark matter: what physical properties prevent it from following the same gravitational path as the visible world?
The researcher Oxford University astrophysicist Becky Smethurst investigates this enigma regarding galactic formations. The video addresses a specific curiosity regarding whether a massive dark matter cloud could theoretically replace a supermassive black hole at a galaxy's center, and why such a cloud doesn't simply collapse into a singularity.
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