Crunch time Is dark energy destined to dominate the universe?

Since the big bang, a cosmic battle has been under way between matter (both dark matter and ordinary) and dark energy.

- By Hannah Devlin

The gravitational force that draws massive objects such as galaxies towards each other works against the expansion of the universe. But astronomical observations show that the universe's expansion has, oddly, been speeding up. This led scientists to conclude that dark energy, a mysterious force acting as a sort of anti-gravity, permeates the entirety of space. And dark energy appeared to be at a significant advantage in the cosmic tug of war.

As space expands, matter becomes more spread out, so its influence weakens. By contrast, dark energy is thought to be a property of space itself. So as space expands, it is constantly filled up with more dark energy, so its strength remains constant and it becomes the runaway winner. That, at least, has been the prediction of the most widely accepted theoretical model of recent decades.