Pod Academy

What is the universe made of?  What is 'dark matter'? Why is the universe still expanding? These are just some of the questions astrophysicist Professor Katherine Freese tackles in this wonderfully accessible interview with Pod Academy's Craig Barfoot. Katherine Freese, is the George Eugene Uhlenbeck Collegiate Professor of Physics at the University of Michigan  and author of The Cosmic Cocktail: Three parts dark matter, the inside story of the epic quest to solve one of the most compelling enigmas of modern science—what is the universe made of?     The ordinary atoms that make up the known universe—from our bodies and the air we breathe to the planets and stars—constitute only 5 percent of all matter and energy in the cosmos. The rest is known as dark matter and dark energy, because their precise identities are unknown.  Prof Freese explains that new galaxies come about when dark matter clumps together, indeed it is dark  matter that dominates structure formation rather than atoms. However, we are not s