The existence of voids, almost entirely empty regions of the cosmic web, has been confirmed by several spectroscopic surveys in the past years. But so far, nobody knew how empty voids really are. By using a technique called gravitational lensing, an international team led by Ohio State CCAPP astrophysicists Peter Melchior and Paul Sutter inferred the mass inside voids - or rather: the absence thereof. This unprecedented measurement confirms earlier predictions and opens a new line of research that will provide insights in how gravity acts on cosmological scales.

Learn more at Nautilus and Oxford Journals