Probing the nature of dark matter using Gaia

Project Level: Honours, Masters, PhD

Gaia is an astronomical satellite that was launched by the European Space in 2013. Its goal is to measure the stellar motions and distances of about 200 billion stars, or about 2% of all stars in the Milky Way, and thereby create the largest and most precise three-dimensional map of our Galaxy. Among many other things, Gaia has allowed astronomers to identify nearly 100   stellar streams in the halo of the Milky Way. Of particular interest are streams coming from dissolving star cluster, since these are compact and dynamically cold and therefore allow astronomers to accurately map the potential of  the Milky Way and the distribution of its dark matter halo. In  this project you will use the Gaia data together with numerical simulations to see what can be learned from the Gaia data about the distribution of dark matter in the Milky Way.