News Astronomy

Dark matter ‘nuggets’ could explain the Milky Way’s mysterious glow

The light could come from clumps of dark antimatter particles smashing into ordinary matter

A large spiral galaxy glows in purple light.

The nearby Andromeda galaxy glows bright in ultraviolet light.

NASA/Swift/Stefan Immler (GSFC) and Erin Grand (UMCP)

By Mara Johnson-Groh

This is a human-written story voiced by AI. Got feedback? Take our survey . (See our AI policy here .)

A puzzling ultraviolet light seen across the Milky Way could come from the destruction of nuggets of dark matter, the mysterious stuff that makes up around a quarter of the matter and energy in the universe.