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9781107677180

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'This is a fascinating detective story, described in a personal and very readable way ... The appendix presents a beautiful summary of relevant definitions of astronomy. Black and white photos, graphs and drawings accompany the text. There are 6 pages of references and a 4-page index.' Bill Howard, CHOICE 'This is a splendid and timely book and the reader is rewarded with an insight into the tantalising conflict between the majority proponent view of dark matter and the competing viewpoint embodied in the Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) hypothesis ... Professor Sanders is an experienced theorist in the field of dark matter astrophysics and is eminently qualified to address this question and he does so with notable clarity. His book is written with the scientific community in mind and the language is uncompromisingly scientific but it is nonetheless fathomable by the non-specialist. The Dark Matter Problem will find an easily accessible place on this reviewer's bookshelf for some time.' Brian Parsons, FAS Newsletter 'In this readable and enjoyable book, Sanders takes us through the historical development of the theory of dark matter ... The Dark Matter Problem will benefit advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and some researchers. ... Students and professionals working in the field may receive this book as a training tool that highlights the current deficiencies of the dark matter paradigm.' Physics Today

'This is a fascinating detective story, described in a personal and very readable way ... The appendix presents a beautiful summary of relevant definitions of astronomy. Black and white photos, graphs and drawings accompany the text. There are 6 pages of references and a 4-page index.' Bill Howard, CHOICE 'This is a splendid and timely book and the reader is rewarded with an insight into the tantalising conflict between the majority proponent view of dark matter and the competing viewpoint embodied in the Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) hypothesis ... Professor Sanders is an experienced theorist in the field of dark matter astrophysics and is eminently qualified to address this question and he does so with notable clarity. His book is written with the scientific community in mind and the language is uncompromisingly scientific but it is nonetheless fathomable by the non-specialist. The Dark Matter Problem will find an easily accessible place on this reviewer's bookshelf for some time.' Brian Parsons, FAS Newsletter 'In this readable and enjoyable book, Sanders takes us through the historical development of the theory of dark matter ... The Dark Matter Problem will benefit advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and some researchers. ... Students and professionals working in the field may receive this book as a training tool that highlights the current deficiencies of the dark matter paradigm.' Physics Today One of the most perplexing problems in astrophysics is the nature of the major component of the universe: dark matter. Author Sanders has been a major researcher in attempts to understand it. In this historical account, the presence of dark matter is traced from its discovery in 1933, through its rediscovery by optical and radio astronomers who investigated the rotation curves of galaxies and the internal motions of clusters of galaxies. They then traced light and mass as a function of galactic radius. Remarkable insight came with the discovery of hot gas in galaxies, satellites that explored details of the cosmic microwave background and the realization that a second problem existed: dark energy. Particle astrophysics and cosmology enter the picture and a realization that modified Newtonian dynamics may have to be invoked to explain phenomena that we cannot directly observe. This is a fascinating detective story, described in a personal and very readable way without much mathematics but presenting arguments that might be hard to follow without some background in physics. The appendix presents a beautiful summary of relevant definitions of astronomy. Black and white photos, graphs and drawings accompany the text. There are 6 pages of references and a 4-page index. Bill Howard, CHOICE Magazine This is a splendid and timely book and the reader is rewarded with an insight into the tantalising conflict between the majority proponent view of dark matter and the competing viewpoint embodied in the Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) hypothesis... Sanders deals in detail with the astrophysical evidence which forms the basis of the dark matter viewpoint and contrasts its successes and shortcomings with the similarly limited success of MOND. The conflict is illustrated beautifully with a detailed account of the successful interpretation of flat galactic rotation curves by both proposals but Sanders also takes time to examine the key role played by the demands of spiral galaxy stability, by studies of Low Surface Brightness Galaxies and by the unique success of MOND in providing a possible basis for the Tully-Fisher Law. What was not available to Krauss in The Fifth Essence is the mass of information gleaned over the past twenty years by satellite based x-ray and microwave instrumentation, by high spacial resolution radio astronomy and through gravitational lensing analyses. ... His book is written with the scientific community in mind and the language is uncompromisingly scientific but it is nonetheless fathomable by the non-specialist. Mathematical argument is kept to a minimum but is perhaps inevitable in discussing MOND - and there is a useful appendix which goes some way to provide a summarised background on which an inexpert reader can base a first reading. The Dark Matter Problem will find an easily accessible place on this reviewer's bookshelf for some time. Brian Parsons, FAS Newsletter, Summer 2010 La cosmologie est-elle en crise? Question apparemment incongrue au regard de l'actuelle pretention des cosmologistes d'avoir perce les secrets du cosmos. Cela dit, en science, on ne reconnait bien souvent une crise qu'apres coup. Y aurait-il donc des signes d'une possible remise en cause de la conception dominante de l'univers? Disons-le tout net: oui. Par exemple, dans l'actuelle theorie du big bang, 95% de l'energie et de la matiere de l'univers manque a l'appel. Pour retomber sur leurs pieds, les cosmologistes ont en effet ete obliges de postuler l'existence d'une matiere et d'une energie de nature inconnue constituant la quasi-totalite de l'univers, tout en reconnaissant etre incapables d'en detecter directement la moindre trace. C'est ce qu'on appelle le probleme de la matiere noire The Dark Matter Problem , qui est presente dans ce livre suivant une approche historique. Ce probleme sera-t-il resolu sans bouleversement majeur de la physique ou de la cosmologie? Pour l'instant, il n'est bien sur pas possible de repondre a une telle question. Mais il est tres instructif de suivre les errements de la recherche en ce domaine. La matiere noire, c'est effectivement l'arlesienne de la cosmologie. On en parle beaucoup depuis 40 ans; on est convaincu de son existence; mais on ne l'a jamais detectee directement. L'astronome Fritz Zwicky fut le premier a montrer dans les annees 1930 qu'il manquait de la matiere dans les amas de galaxies. Ne sachant pas trop quoi en penser, les astrophysiciens preterent peu attention a cette anomalie. Mais elle refit surface dans les annees 1970 quand on s'apercut que les galaxies tournaient plus vite qu'elles auraient du, a en juger par la masse de leur matiere visible. Jusque la, rien de vraiment dramatique. Pourquoi faudrait-il que toute la matiere soit visible? Le probleme allait toutefois se corser. Toujours dans ces annees 1970, la theorie du big bang assoit son hegemonie. Or s'il existe autant de matiere que le suggere la dynami ... readable and enjoyable book... On the whole, The Dark Matter Problem will benefit advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and some researchers. Students and professionals in the field may receive this book as a training tool that highlights the current deficiencies of the dark-matter paradigm. Understanding those deficiencies is an important part of the learning process. Liliya L. R. Williams, Physics Today

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Robert H. Sanders is Professor Emeritus at the Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, Groningen, The Netherlands. He has worked in the field of dark matter for many years.

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