By Andrew Grant
A cosmic collision has somehow separated a galaxy from its dark matter, the mysterious invisible stuff that typically dominates a galaxy’s mass. The dark matter may be lagging behind its host galaxy because another clump of dark matter slowed it down. If so, it would be the first evidence that dark matter interacts through a force other than gravity.
“It’s exciting to wonder if it could be dark matter interacting with itself,” says Neal Weiner, a theoretical physicist at New York University.