New Progress of dark matter particle observation and research

　The nature of this dark matter is one of the burning issues of science. Identifying it would point the way to a deeper understanding of the laws of nature and the Einsteinian dream of a unified theory of physics. Purple Mountain Observatory, by observing high energy cosmic ray electron in the Antarctic balloon detector (ATIC), made important progress in the dark matter particle search. After 10 years observation, They have discovered a puzzling surplus of high-energy electrons which energy are between 300 to 800 GeV bombarding Earth from space. This surplus indicates a nearby source of energetic electrons. Such electrons could arise from the annihilation of dark matter particles (such as a Kaluza–Klein particle with a mass of about 620 GeV). If the Kaluza–Klein annihilation explanation proves to be correct, this will necessitate a fuller investigation of such multi-dimensional spaces, with potentially important implications for our understanding of the Universe. The results were reported in the Nov. 20th issue of the journal Nature which has got a wide recognition in the world. More than 100 media have reported this story such as New York Times, Nature and Science.

　The American Institute of Physics has selected this result as one of the 10 Top Physics Stories of the 2008, In Europe, The ATIC result has been listed as a Physics Today Favorite for December 2008.