Author Topic: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.  (Read 2301 times)

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Offline LateForLunch

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Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« on: November 17, 2016, 06:27:58 pm »
http://phys.org/news/2016-08-physicists-discovery-nature.html

For those who follow physics, you already know the other four basic forces of Nature:
Electromagnetism
Gravity
Weak atomic (electroweak)
Strong Atomic (gluons)

Most of the time when science has discovered a new force of nature, tremendous new technologies and inventions resulted. From the discovery of EM force came radios, electronics, televisions, lasers, computers.

From the discovery of the Strong Atomic force came thermonuclear weapons.

One can only imagine what will result from discovery of the quantum form of Gravity (anti-Gravity machines? Faster-than-light travel?).

This article is fairly abstruse and will likely mean little to anyone except those who follow physics as a hobby. But what it may mean is that the jigsaw puzzle that is our universe might just have gotten another edge piece. 
« Last Edit: November 17, 2016, 06:29:52 pm by LateForLunch »
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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #1 on: November 17, 2016, 06:29:52 pm »
Cool!!!!

Offline EC

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #2 on: November 18, 2016, 05:43:25 am »
I thought the 5th fundamental force was already determined as apathy.
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #3 on: November 18, 2016, 07:20:19 am »
I thought the 5th fundamental force was already determined as apathy.
Oh, I just thought that was a practical application of entropy.
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Offline DB

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #4 on: November 18, 2016, 08:19:26 am »
Interesting, thank you for posting it.

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #5 on: November 18, 2016, 03:12:34 pm »
I thought the 5th fundamental force was already determined as apathy.
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Meh.  If you say so..

Offline Taxcontrol

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #6 on: November 18, 2016, 05:04:51 pm »
I have often thought that for the unified field theory to be so elusive, we must be missing something.  Perhaps this is it.

Offline Doug Loss

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #7 on: November 18, 2016, 07:37:37 pm »
This isn't the first time a "fifth fundamental force" has been discovered.  I'll wait to see some corroborating experiments before getting interested.
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Offline LateForLunch

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #8 on: November 18, 2016, 08:43:29 pm »
I have often thought that for the unified field theory to be so elusive, we must be missing something.  Perhaps this is it.

Since there is a potential link between neutrons, electrons and the new particle I looked up neutrons to try to get a better idea of what that might be. I discovered that neutrons are basically protons and that neutrons can decay readily into protons. I also discovered that neutrons do not ordinarily appear in nature for very long because they decay into protons in only about 15 minutes after being separated from an atomic nucleus.

Free protons are abundant in the universe and make up much of the solar wind. Since free neutrons normally do not (except theoretically inside neutron stars), it was interesting to read the following Wikipedia article excerpt:

Neutron Compounds

Dineutrons and tetraneutrons

Main articles: Dineutron and Tetraneutron

The existence of stable clusters of 4 neutrons, or tetraneutrons, has been hypothesised by a team led by Francisco-Miguel Marqués at the CNRS Laboratory for Nuclear Physics based on observations of the disintegration of beryllium-14 nuclei. This is particularly interesting because current theory suggests that these clusters should not be stable.

In February 2016, Japanese physicist Susumu Shimoura of the University of Tokyo and co-workers reported they had observed the purported tetraneutrons for the first time experimentally.[73] Nuclear physicists around the world say this discovery, if confirmed, would be a milestone in the field of nuclear physics and certainly would deepen our understanding of the nuclear forces.[74][75]

The dineutron is another hypothetical particle. In 2012, Artemis Spyrou from Michigan State University and coworkers reported that they observed, for the first time, the dineutron emission in the decay of 16Be. The dineutron character is evidenced by a small emission angle between the two neutrons. The authors measured the two-neutron separation energy to be 1.35(10) MeV, in good agreement with shell model calculations, using standard interactions for this mass region.[76]

Neutronium and neutron stars[edit]

Main articles: Neutronium and Neutron star

At extremely high pressures and temperatures, nucleons and electrons are believed to collapse into bulk neutronic matter, called neutronium. This is presumed to happen in neutron stars.

The extreme pressure inside a neutron star may deform the neutrons into a cubic symmetry, allowing tighter packing of neutrons. END ARTICLE

The core of all conventional matter (baryons) is a proton. Theorists have always mused about what the properties would be of a form of matter only comprised of neutrons without any protons. I suppose that it is conceivable that matter which was made of only neutrons might have some properties that are associated with Dark Matter.

That is only speculation by a layman I know. Also, even though neutrons are electrically neutral, they do interact with all of the same fundamental forces as protons, which suggests that since Dark Matter is transparent to light, it is not comprised of neutron matter - because it would be opaque to light just as would regular matter.
 
« Last Edit: November 18, 2016, 08:51:05 pm by LateForLunch »
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #9 on: November 18, 2016, 08:59:27 pm »
Quote
Also, even though neutrons are electrically neutral, they do interact with all of the same fundamental forces as protons, which suggests that since Dark Matter is transparent to light, it is not comprised of neutron matter - because it would be opaque to light just as would regular matter.

If it is that dense, it might just bend the light around it.
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Offline LateForLunch

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #10 on: November 19, 2016, 03:07:10 am »
If it is that dense, it might just bend the light around it.

Yes, I considered that, sieur. But the only solid materials which bend light without distortion but rather magnify light as masses of dark matter do (forming the famous gravity lenses which allow telescopes to see to the limits of the universe and almost to the beginning of Time), are known as meta-materials and they do not occur naturally (requiring minute engineering to ultra-precise specifications equivalent to say the finest Swiss watch or intricate jewelry). It is a fascinating idea that just as there are natural masers, there might be natural meta-materials which act as powerful amplifying lenses for light passing through without distorting it. Based on my limited knowledge of physics and optics, it seems likely that a galaxy-sized cloud of neutron matter would behave like any other cloud of matter and severely distort and dim any light which passed through it.

So if Dark Matter has particle form and they are like conventional particles at all, they would behave in that sense more like bosons than baryons, which would make them an entirely different animal since there are no solid particle which behave like bosons very much.

Of course, if neutrons could clump together in crystalline structure in free space as they do in the interior of neutron stars, they might form huge solid solid lenses like gargantuan magnifying glasses. But I would imagine that any solid structures of that size would fragment due to gravity acting upon it or disruption by other cosmic phenomena and become visible as would shards of glass. But no such evidence has ever appeared in telescopic observations of the cosmos as far as I am aware.
« Last Edit: November 19, 2016, 03:14:39 am by LateForLunch »
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #11 on: November 19, 2016, 03:17:13 am »
Yes, I considered that, sieur. But the only solid materials which bend light without distortion but rather magnify light as masses of dark matter do (forming the famous gravity lenses which allow telescopes to see to the limits of the universe and almost to the beginning of Time), are known as meta-materials and they do not occur naturally (requiring minute engineering to ultra-precise specifications equivalent to say the finest Swiss watch or intricate jewelry). It is a fascinating idea that just as there are natural masers, there might be natural meta-materials which act as powerful amplifying lenses for light passing through without distorting it. Based on my limited knowledge of physics and optics, it seems likely that a galaxy-sized cloud of neutron matter would behave like any other cloud of matter and severely distort and dim any light which passed through it.

So if Dark Matter has particle form and they are like conventional particles at all, they would behave in that sense more like bosons than baryons, which would make them an entirely different animal since there are no solid particle which behave like bosons very much.

Of course, if neutrons could clump together in crystalline structure in free space as they do in the interior of neutron stars, they might form huge solid solid lenses like gargantuan magnifying glasses. But I would imagine that any solid structures of that size would fragment due to gravity acting upon it or disruption by other cosmic phenomena and become visible as would shards of glass. But no such evidence has ever appeared in telescopic observations of the cosmos as far as I am aware.
Let's suppose for a second that such 'lenses' existed, either as something approaching crystalline masses or even spheres (evenly distributed force would tend to form a sphere, like with ordinary matter), and that that gravitational pull would accelerate the light moving around it, giving it a doppler style shift. What would you look for in the telescope to find one?
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Offline LateForLunch

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #12 on: November 19, 2016, 04:56:00 am »
Let's suppose for a second that such 'lenses' existed, either as something approaching crystalline masses or even spheres (evenly distributed force would tend to form a sphere, like with ordinary matter), and that that gravitational pull would accelerate the light moving around it, giving it a doppler style shift. What would you look for in the telescope to find one?

It would be too small to see from Earth. Stars can only be seen because of the radiation they emit. I think I know where you're going - say a neutron star's core is left behind after the outer shell is cast off and the cloud dissipates. As it travels around the galaxy its sidereal orbit would take it out of the debris field left over from the neutron-star phase and so it might circle the cosmos like a huge crystal ball, transparent to light toward the center but distorting it at the edges.

The problem is that the gravity lenses that we see from Earth are apparently the size of galaxies, not just stars. They seem to be light years away but whole galaxies may still be seen through them, which means that they must be galactic in size as well - otherwise they'd have to be a lot closer to Earth than they appear to be in order to see that much space behind them.

Also, solid objects in space tend to fairly rapidly accumulate surface dust, so even an object that was perfectly transparent would soon get covered with opaque dust. Even though neutrons are electrically neutral, they apparently can acquire charge on their surface due to other factors including the motion of the up and down quarks in the interior of the neutrons themselves and their contact with other particles in physical proximity. Surface charge, either negative or positive would doubtless result in surface dust or erosion (deterioration) of the clarity of the surface or breakdowns in the crystalline structure.
« Last Edit: November 19, 2016, 05:08:24 am by LateForLunch »
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Offline uglybiker

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #13 on: November 19, 2016, 07:04:09 am »
What? No mention of Mamma?
I don't know about their mamma, but when mine got worked up, she turned into a force of nature!
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Offline montanajoe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #14 on: November 19, 2016, 08:49:41 am »
From the article peculation that "there may also be a separate dark sector with its own matter and forces." That would really be interesting, seems to me if proven true anti-matter, anti-matter claims in science fiction could become a reality...verrrrry interesting

Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #15 on: November 19, 2016, 09:51:36 am »
What? No mention of Mamma?
I don't know about their mamma, but when mine got worked up, she turned into a force of nature!
Hell hath no fury like that of a woman scorned!
« Last Edit: November 19, 2016, 09:51:57 am by Smokin Joe »
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C S Lewis

Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #16 on: November 19, 2016, 09:59:09 am »
It would be too small to see from Earth. Stars can only be seen because of the radiation they emit. I think I know where you're going - say a neutron star's core is left behind after the outer shell is cast off and the cloud dissipates. As it travels around the galaxy its sidereal orbit would take it out of the debris field left over from the neutron-star phase and so it might circle the cosmos like a huge crystal ball, transparent to light toward the center but distorting it at the edges.

The problem is that the gravity lenses that we see from Earth are apparently the size of galaxies, not just stars. They seem to be light years away but whole galaxies may still be seen through them, which means that they must be galactic in size as well - otherwise they'd have to be a lot closer to Earth than they appear to be in order to see that much space behind them.

Also, solid objects in space tend to fairly rapidly accumulate surface dust, so even an object that was perfectly transparent would soon get covered with opaque dust. Even though neutrons are electrically neutral, they apparently can acquire charge on their surface due to other factors including the motion of the up and down quarks in the interior of the neutrons themselves and their contact with other particles in physical proximity. Surface charge, either negative or positive would doubtless result in surface dust or erosion (deterioration) of the clarity of the surface or breakdowns in the crystalline structure.
It isn't a question of the matter itself being transparent. If dense enough to bend light around itself, all we would see is the light it bent, and never the object itself (at least not from a range where escaping the gravity field would be likely).

Think of a spherical grain with fluid flowing around it. The light would be the fluid, some of which would be absorbed on the upstream end, but on the downstream end, in the direction of propagation, the light would be bent around the object, effectively cloaking it from view.
That light would be accelerated, distorted in terms of wavelength, and would experience some sort of shift.

It would be similar to looking for a 'hole in the water' with passive sonar, looking for a quiet object against the normal stream of noises in the sea, an acoustically dead zone.

Only with a supermassive (not in terms of size, but mass) object, that 'hole in the aether' would be masked by light bent around the object. That light, however should be distorted at what appears to be a point source, and that would be the indicator of the presence of the object. Not looking for a thing, so much as the effect its presence has on what is around it.
How God must weep at humans' folly! Stand fast! God knows what he is doing!
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis

Offline LateForLunch

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #17 on: November 20, 2016, 02:32:51 am »
It isn't a question of the matter itself being transparent. If dense enough to bend light around itself, all we would see is the light it bent, and never the object itself (at least not from a range where escaping the gravity field would be likely).

Think of a spherical grain with fluid flowing around it. The light would be the fluid, some of which would be absorbed on the upstream end, but on the downstream end, in the direction of propagation, the light would be bent around the object, effectively cloaking it from view.
That light would be accelerated, distorted in terms of wavelength, and would experience some sort of shift.

It would be similar to looking for a 'hole in the water' with passive sonar, looking for a quiet object against the normal stream of noises in the sea, an acoustically dead zone.

Only with a supermassive (not in terms of size, but mass) object, that 'hole in the aether' would be masked by light bent around the object. That light, however should be distorted at what appears to be a point source, and that would be the indicator of the presence of the object. Not looking for a thing, so much as the effect its presence has on what is around it.

Yes, I get it now. That is essentially what I think artificially-created meta materials do. Non-optical lenses, light amplifiers and the primitive "cloaking" devices. Bending light around. 

I'm thinking however that an object like a neutron star core would be more lens-shaped than spherical because neutron stars spin very fast, which would possibly tend to make the core bigger around at the equator than the poles (assuming that it retained any elasticity as a material or in how it forms as a crystalline structure). So a neutron star core might look more like a lens from the side view but seem like a round disc viewed through the center from the top to bottom. I doubt it would be transparent, so even if it was lens shaped, it would not behave like a lens in the sense of refracting or magnifying light passing through it. As you pointed out, the light modifying effect if any would derive from intense gravity.   
« Last Edit: November 20, 2016, 02:41:52 am by LateForLunch »
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Offline LateForLunch

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #18 on: November 20, 2016, 02:56:28 am »
From the article peculation that "there may also be a separate dark sector with its own matter and forces." That would really be interesting, seems to me if proven true anti-matter, anti-matter claims in science fiction could become a reality...verrrrry interesting

actually they are already creating antimatter atoms. Anti-hydrogen and another anti-atom whose name escapes me have been held in a vacuum storage chamber long enough to observe some of their properties.

Neutrons, electrons, and the weak atomic force are not antimatter. They are negatively charged or neutral forms of conventional matter/forces. Neutrons are still comprised of quarks that are both negative and positively-sharged but which cancel eachother out leaving the neutron without either a strong positive or negative charge. Anti-matter is comprised of anti-quarks which have the same flavor as conventional quarks but with opposite charge. They form materials in the opposite configuration from matter. For instance a proton that is normally comprised of two up quarks and one down, will have an anti-proton configuration of  two anti-up quarks and one anti-down quark.

Particles or forces which are the opposite of the various flavors and colors of quarks have not been discovered yet - but this discovery might be one of them. That could open up a whole new dimension of study and of course, might have something to do with Dark Matter, which would be pretty weird for sure.

There is no discussion that I am aware of Dark Matter likely being anti-matter. IT might however be something even more strange, such as a type of particle that behaves more like a (massless) boson than a (solid) hadron. THAT would be something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT.

Dark Energy on the other hand seems to have many of the properties of what anti-gravity would reasonably look like, and so might have some connection to really exotic anti-forces (anti-bosons) which are even more strange than anti-matter. That's what they are hoping to find in some of this research. But Dark Matter and Dark Energy may not have any strong relationship fundamentally.
If Dark Matter is related to Dark Energy it is likely in some way that we have not discovered anything about yet - hence the intense interest in anything that even hints at an anti-boson.

Since chromoelectric force that makes up the "flavors" of quarks is not simply positive or negative, it is intriguing for physicists to speculate as to what the opposite of quarks or bosons might look like and how they might behave differently from their ordinary doppelgangers.

That is sort of what I get from their speculation about a "dark sector". Because of mathematical correlations, the weak atomic force has already been linked to electromagnetic force. In fact the technical name of the weak atomic force is the electroweak force. So it's not a far stretch to think there might be other particles or forces linked to leptons ( electrons) or their weak cousins (mesons). Likewise, it is not much of a stretch to think that neutrons might have a more fundamental link to neutrinos.

What makes all of this so difficult is that these particles are so small and wispy and the forces that make them up so weak relative to other forces in our universe that discerning their existence is sort of like listening for whispers in a blast furnace or trying to find a pinpoint of slightly brighter light on the surface of the sun. 
« Last Edit: November 20, 2016, 03:24:48 am by LateForLunch »
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #19 on: November 20, 2016, 03:10:40 am »
Yes, I get it now. That is essentially what I think artificially-created meta materials do. Non-optical lenses, light amplifiers and the primitive "cloaking" devices. Bending light around. 

I'm thinking however that an object like a neutron star core would be more lens-shaped than spherical because neutron stars spin very fast, which would possibly tend to make the core bigger around at the equator than the poles (assuming that it retained any elasticity as a material or in how it forms as a crystalline structure). So a neutron star core might look more like a lens from the side view but seem like a round disc viewed through the center from the top to bottom. I doubt it would be transparent, so even if it was lens shaped, it would not behave like a lens in the sense of refracting or magnifying light passing through it. As you pointed out, the light modifying effect if any would derive from intense gravity.
So that begs another question. If the gravitational effect of a lens shaped object is greatest at the greatest mass, less at the edges where the mass is lower, might the 'flow' of light past that object resemble the flow of air over a lenticular surface? (Back to primitive cloaking) However, the question is one of what alteration to the light in terms of wavelength would be expected, and would the speed of light be distorted in proximity to the 'supermass', as well? Would that distortion have a time dilation effect?

A sort of a Venturi effect, where the light was either slowed at the greatest mass and sped up again at the lowest mass (assuming the light is traveling in a plane parallel to the equator of the mass--no doubt the universe would be more complicated than that, but I'm trying for a basic concept.)
How God must weep at humans' folly! Stand fast! God knows what he is doing!
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis

Offline montanajoe

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Re: Fifth fundamental force of Nature possibly discovered at UCI.
« Reply #20 on: November 20, 2016, 06:39:42 am »
actually they are already creating antimatter atoms. Anti-hydrogen and another anti-atom whose name escapes me have been held in a vacuum storage chamber long enough to observe some of their properties.

Neutrons, electrons, and the weak atomic force are not antimatter. They are negatively charged or neutral forms of conventional matter/forces. Neutrons are still comprised of quarks that are both negative and positively-sharged but which cancel eachother out leaving the neutron without either a strong positive or negative charge. Anti-matter is comprised of anti-quarks which have the same flavor as conventional quarks but with opposite charge. They form materials in the opposite configuration from matter. For instance a proton that is normally comprised of two up quarks and one down, will have an anti-proton configuration of  two anti-up quarks and one anti-down quark.

Particles or forces which are the opposite of the various flavors and colors of quarks have not been discovered yet - but this discovery might be one of them. That could open up a whole new dimension of study and of course, might have something to do with Dark Matter, which would be pretty weird for sure.

There is no discussion that I am aware of Dark Matter likely being anti-matter. IT might however be something even more strange, such as a type of particle that behaves more like a (massless) boson than a (solid) hadron. THAT would be something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT.

Dark Energy on the other hand seems to have many of the properties of what anti-gravity would reasonably look like, and so might have some connection to really exotic anti-forces (anti-bosons) which are even more strange than anti-matter. That's what they are hoping to find in some of this research. But Dark Matter and Dark Energy may not have any strong relationship fundamentally.
If Dark Matter is related to Dark Energy it is likely in some way that we have not discovered anything about yet - hence the intense interest in anything that even hints at an anti-boson.

Since chromoelectric force that makes up the "flavors" of quarks is not simply positive or negative, it is intriguing for physicists to speculate as to what the opposite of quarks or bosons might look like and how they might behave differently from their ordinary doppelgangers.

That is sort of what I get from their speculation about a "dark sector". Because of mathematical correlations, the weak atomic force has already been linked to electromagnetic force. In fact the technical name of the weak atomic force is the electroweak force. So it's not a far stretch to think there might be other particles or forces linked to leptons ( electrons) or their weak cousins (mesons). Likewise, it is not much of a stretch to think that neutrons might have a more fundamental link to neutrinos.

What makes all of this so difficult is that these particles are so small and wispy and the forces that make them up so weak relative to other forces in our universe that discerning their existence is sort of like listening for whispers in a blast furnace or trying to find a pinpoint of slightly brighter light on the surface of the sun.
@LateForLunch

Thank you for the detailed explanation.  :beer: This sort of stuff really fascinates me but I don't have the time or brain cells to keep up with it anymore thanks again..