The 4% Universe - 4% science...96% stories.

That is this book in a nutshell. If you are looking for a book on the science behind Dark Matter and Dark Energy, look elsewhere. But if you are looking for the stories about the astonomers behind the discovery of both Dark Matter and Dark Energy, definitely pick up this book.

Panek gives a lively account of how the discovery of these two elusive subjects came about. I would say the first 1/3 of the book focuses on Dark Matter, with the rest heavily revolving around Dark Energy. At times the writing was a bit over the top for me, however this book is anything but boring and Panek clearly did his research. There are lots of astronomers/physicists to keep track of, and at times Panek introduced a new name without ever telling us about them. For the most part, the narrative is easy to follow despite the many names, and the science is easy to understand. I don't know that I have ever read shorter descriptions of science that so easily and clearly got their point across.

We learn about Vera Rubin and her discovery that galaxies rotate at the same speed no matter the distance from the galactic center, the intersection of particle physics and astronomy (cosmology), and the search for the 2 main questions in cosmology: what is the value of the Hubble Constant and how much has the expansion rate changed over time. But the majority of the narrative focuses on the two competing teams who discovered that the universe isn't just expanding...it's accelerating; the Supernova Cosmology project headed by Saul Perlmutter at Berkely and the High-z team headed by Brian Schmidt.

In the first chapter Panek brings up an interesting theme of astronomy. We as humans are constantly thinking we can't understand something, only to figure it out through science. Ptolemy believed we would never understand the heavens, but with the invention of the telescope came that understanding. Or more recently thinking we can never know how the universe began because we can't go back in time, yet with the discovery of the CMB we came to an understanding for that too. Currently, there are theorists and astronomers who believe we will never truly know the nature of dark matter and dark energy. I think if history tells us anything, we need only have some patience and wait for that understanding to come as well.