As part of running the Hawking Physics Society for the past two terms, I invited Cosmologist Luisa Lucie-Smith (pictured) to give a talk for the Wollstonecraft Lecture series to our Sixth Form. Luisa is currently working towards a PhD at UCL, researching dark matter formations within the field of Early Universe Cosmology.

Dark matter is something I find particularly interesting as it cannot be observed (hence why it is called dark). Like normal matter, it is affected by gravity. However, it remains unaffected by the Electromagnetic Force and there is little known about its properties. From Luisa’s talk, I learned about how dark matter has influenced the formation of our galaxies. She even showed us some simulations from a super computer, which emphasise how different the Universe would look without dark matter. As well as this, she showed us that dark matter appears to be distributed across the Universe in a specific pattern, with points of high concentration and points of low concentration.

All in all, it was incredibly inspiring to see another young female in Physics. I look forward to learning about this in more depth when reading Theoretical Physics at University next year.