A brainless, single-celled organism with a knack for finding food is helping astronomers study the largest, most mysterious structure in the universe — the cosmic web. But, first, things could get a bit slimy.
The cosmic web is a vast network of interconnected filaments made of dark matter and gas that forms the scaffolding the entire universe is built upon. These filaments can stretch hundreds of millions of light-years, and they connect galaxies, galaxy clusters and even galaxy superclusters. However, because the cosmic web is incredibly faint — and the dark matter within it doesn’t interact with light — it’s extremely difficult to map.
