Colloquium on Sep. 10, 2026

What Can Weak Lensing Reveal About Dark Acoustic Oscillations?

Speaker: Yue-Lin Sming Tsai (Purple Mountain Observatory)

Venue: SWIFAR Building 2111

Time: 16:00 PM, Thursday, Sep. 10, 2026

Abstract:

In this talk, I will discuss dark acoustic oscillations as a way to probe whether dark matter has interactions beyond gravity. We have studied four different dark matter models, and all of them leave distinctive "wiggles" in the formation of cosmic structures, which can be detected through weak gravitational lensing. With current DES data, we have already placed strong constraints on scattering between dark matter and protons. Meanwhile, interactions between dark matter and neutrinos or with a mirror world could also explain the long‑standing tension in the growth of structure today. The most exciting part is the upcoming China Space Station Telescope (CSST), which will greatly enhance our detection power. It can improve the limits on these interactions by an order of magnitude and measure the abundance of mirror baryons with very high precision. In short, this telescope will help us truly test whether dark matter feels only gravity, and may bring new insights into the nature of dark matter.

Report PPT:  SWIFAR_Hong Guo.pptx