Astronomers expose CO-dark molecular gas, previously invisible to telescopes

An international team of astronomers has created the first-ever large-scale maps of a mysterious form of matter, known as CO-dark molecular gas, in one of our Milky Way’s most active star-forming neighborhoods, Cygnus X. Their findings, using the Green Bank Telescope (GBT), are providing crucial new clues about how stars formed in the Milky Way.