New lab turns SD gold town into scientific hub

[hue]

http://news.yahoo.com/lab-turns-sd-gold-town-scientific-hub-070558538--finance.html

LEAD, S.D. (AP) — Nestled nearly 5,000 feet beneath the earth in the gold boom town of Lead, S.D., is a laboratory that could help scientists answer some pretty heavy questions about life, its origins and the universe.

It's hard to spot from the surface. Looking around the rustic town, there are far more nods to its mining past than to its scientific future, but on Wednesday, when part of the closed Homestake Gold Mine officially becomes an underground campus, Lead's name will be known in scientific circles as the place where the elusive stuff called dark matter might finally be detected.

Unimpressed? Consider this: It's sure to earn itself a reference on TV's "The Big Bang Theory."

"This year, 2012, is going to be a very significant year because we get to turn the ... detector on and know very soon whether we have actually found dark matter or not," said Rick Gaitskell, a scientist with Brown University who has worked alongside dozens of scientists over the past few years to move forward with the Large Underground Xenon experiment — or LUX — the world's most sensitive dark-matter detector.

[longship]

1. Dark matter rules

It's just that nobody knows what the 'f' it is.

R&K