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Life

Universe's dark matter mix is 'just right' for life

By Anil Ananthaswamy

3 December 2008

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

All life on Earth may owe its existence to the right balance of dark matter in the universe

(Image: NASA)

IT’S not just the nature of dark matter that’s a mystery – even its abundance is inexplicable. But if our universe is just one of many possible universes, at least this conundrum can be explained.

The total amount of dark matter – the unseen stuff thought to make up most of the mass of the universe – is five to six times that of normal matter. This difference sounds pretty significant, but it could have been much greater, because the two…

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