Speaker: Catherine Heymans (Royal Observatory, Edinburgh)
Title: Cosmic Concordance or Tension: Cosmology from the Kilo-Degree Survey
Abstract:
The Planck space mission has released exquisite observations of the early universe, providing the strongest evidence yet that the universe we live in is very dark indeed. Its precise results show that our universe is composed of 27% dark matter and 68% dark energy, while less than 5% is made up of the baryonic material that we are familiar with on Earth.  With their long-standing quest to make these precision measurements essentially now concluded, cosmologists have turned their attention to a much bigger and further-reaching question: what is the exact nature of this dark universe? I will introduce the Kilo-Degree Survey (KiDS), which we’ve used to map out the invisible dark matter and confront theories on the origins of dark energy. Interestingly the increasing precision from KiDS reveals a tension with Planck’s initial conclusions.  Is this is a sign that new data challenges lie ahead, or is it our first hint that the universe is truely exotic and that in order to understand the dark universe we will need some new physics that will forever change our cosmic view.