The latest findings from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) challenge long-held beliefs about dark energy.
By analyzing three years of cosmic data, scientists are seeing strong hints that dark energy, previously thought to be a constant force driving the universe’s expansion, might actually be evolving over time. This revelation could shake up the standard model of physics as we know it.
Dark Energy: A Changing Constant?
A new analysis of three years’ worth of data from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) provides even stronger evidence that dark energy, long assumed to be a fixed “cosmological constant,” might actually be evolving over time in unexpected ways.
Dr. Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki, a physics professor at The University of Texas at Dallas, co-chairs the DESI working group responsible for interpreting the survey’s cosmological data. The DESI collaboration includes more than 900 researchers from over 70 institutions worldwide. In April 2024, at a meeting of the American Physical Society, Ishak-Boushaki presented the first-year analysis of DESI’s data, which offered early hints that dark energy may not be as constant as once believed.
Though dark energy remains a mystery, many scientists agree that it plays a crucial role in the universe’s accelerating expansion.
Is Dark Energy Weakening?
The latest DESI findings, combined with other measurements, add to growing evidence that dark energy’s effects may be weakening over time, suggesting that our current model of the universe may need revision.
These supporting measurements include data from the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the light left over from the early universe, along with observations of supernovae and weak gravitational lensing, which tracks how gravity distorts light from distant galaxies.
The collaboration shared its findings on March 19 in multiple papers posted on the online repository arXiv and in a presentation at the American Physical Society’s Global Physics Summit in Anaheim, California.
Researchers said that so far, the preference for an evolving dark energy has not yet risen to a statistical significance of 5 sigma, the gold standard in physics that represents the threshold for a discovery. However, different combinations of DESI data mixed with the CMB, supernovae and weak lensing measurements set the range from 2.8 sigma to 4.2 sigma.
A Point of No Return for Cosmology?
“With a 4.2 sigma significance, I think we are getting to the point of no return,” Ishak-Boushaki said. “In this new analysis, not only have we confirmed our previous findings that dark energy is likely evolving over time, but we are increasing their significance. The point that I find the most exciting is that the evidence is coming from different datasets.
“I’ve worked on the question of cosmic acceleration for 25 years, and my perspective is, if the evidence continues to grow, and it is likely to, then this will be huge for cosmology and all of physics.”
DESI has made the largest 3D map of our universe to date and uses it to study dark energy. Earth is at the center in this animation, and every dot is a galaxy. Credit: DESI collaboration and KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/R. Proctor
DESI: Mapping the Universe on an Unprecedented Scale
DESI is one of the most extensive surveys of the cosmos ever conducted. The state-of-the-art instrument can capture light from 5,000 galaxies simultaneously. The experiment is now in its fourth year surveying the sky and aims to measure roughly 50 million galaxies and quasars by the time the project ends.
The new analysis uses data from the first three years of observations of nearly 15 million galaxies and quasars.
Explore Further: Is the Universe Changing? Breakthrough Data Suggests Dark Energy Is Evolving
Meeting: Global Physics Summit 2025
DESI was constructed and is operated with funding from the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science and sits atop the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory, which is operated by the NSF’s NOIRLab. The DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory manages the DESI experiment.
DESI also is supported by the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, a DOE Office of Science national user facility. Additional support for DESI is provided by the NSF; the Science and Technology Facilities Council of the United Kingdom; the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation; the Heising-Simons Foundation; the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission; the National Council of Humanities, Sciences, and Technologies of Mexico; the Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain; and DESI member institutions.
The DESI collaboration is honored to be permitted to conduct scientific research on Iolkam Du’ag (Kitt Peak), a mountain with particular significance to the Tohono O’odham Nation.
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DESI is one of the most extensive surveys of the cosmos ever conducted. The state-of-the-art instrument can capture light from 5,000 galaxies simultaneously. The experiment is now in its fourth year surveying the sky and aims to measure roughly 50 million galaxies and quasars by the time the project ends. Blind people touching elephants is always a fact and evidence. Smart people use their brains to think, rather than endless arguments and confirms with narrow local boundaries.
The Fluidized Absolute Space Theory (FAST) and the Topological Vortex Theory (TVT) resolve the ontological divide between relativistic geometry and quantum uncertainty by geometrizing entanglement through shared vortex weaving. This framework offers falsifiable predictions for quantum gravitational phenomena, including Planck-scale defect signatures and modified Hubble flow dynamics. The relationship between FAST and TVT can be analogized as a “medium-structure” duality: FAST establishes spacetime’s ontological framework as a dynamic fluidized medium, while TVT delineates the evolutionary laws of topological vortices as functional structures within this medium. This synergy provides a novel paradigmatic pathway for unifying quantum gravity, reconstructing causality, and interpreting cross-scale physical phenomena.
The ideal world is not far away, and we have never and cannot leave the vast ocean of ideal fluids. In an ideal fluid world, topological spin creates everything and shapes everything. From cosmic accretion disks to quantum spins, vortex structures are ubiquitous. Whether you like it or not, spin has achieved us, and we are also achieving spin.
Cosmic vortex network, via its topological dynamics, reconstructs the statistical properties of spacetime itself. Consequently, geometric parameters in the standard cosmological model require physical correction terms tied to vortex tension and weaving density.
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Dark matter and it’s Dark energy energetic component is just the modern name for the old scientific concept of the Aether. The vacuum of space has an intrinsic energy component that we observe as virtual particles that instantaneously pop in and out of our spacetime dimension.
This adjacent two dimensional Aether universe exists ubiquitously and congruently with our own, they co-exist and manifest as the energetic universe. Hypothetically, this dark matter Aether dimension contains energetic electric charge and field components that function as the transport medium for all waves that make up the electromagnetic spectrum and all EM and magnetic fields including gravity. This hypothesized adjacent and complementary energetic dimension might consist of a form of 2 dimensional quark-gluon elementary matter that exhibits electromagnetic field components that interact with our 3D space+time dimension, and when distorted by the presence of 3D physical mass exerts a gravitational effect on the space-time in our dimension.
Another form of ‘dark energy’ with effects which weaken the further the observer is from the source is gravity. The only placeholder required for this is a greater -than-three dimensional singularity, and according to the Standard Model, we’ve already got one of those. Try it out.