By John Flood

Joe Hu/Town Crier Los Altos Hills resident Jerome Drexler, 79, former CEO of Drexler Technology Corporation and inventor of the laser optical storage system, has a theory that could unlock the decades- old mystery about dark matter.

Los Altos Hills resident Jerome Drexler is obsessed with a mystery that has baffled astrophysicists and cosmologists for decades.

Drexler is the acknowledged inventor of the laser optical storage system and former CEO of Drexler Technology Corp., which became the Mountain View-based LaserCard Corp. in 2004.

For the past eight years, he has studied dark matter, an undefined, unseen material that scientists estimate makes up more than 80 percent of the cosmos.

Scientists detect its presence indirectly through the movement of astronomical objects.

Drexler has a theory about dark matter that he believes could crack open the mystery and eventually lead to dramatic insights into its nature and that of the universe.

“Mainstream scientists don’t know what dark matter is,” Drexler said. “It’s one of the biggest mysteries known to man today. Since it represents 83 percent of the universe, that makes it a major mystery.”

Caltech astronomer Fritz Zwicky discovered the presence of dark matter by accident in 1933 when he calculated the motion of distant galaxies.

But it wasn’t until the 1970s that other astronomers took an active interest in Zwicky’s discovery.

Intent on finding evidence to support his theory, Drexler, 79, spends hours each day poring over up to 25 research papers he culls from the Web. He has written two books on the subject.

“In my second book (”Comprehending and Decoding the Cosmos,” published by Universal in 2006) I explain 15 to 25 mysteries that no mainstream cosmologist can explain,” he said. “The first 15 explanations are very solid.”

The stakes are high. Astrophysicists and cosmologists believe that understanding dark matter could play a crucial role in comprehending the structure of the universe and in validating the theories about its origin and its fate.

Drexler’s began his career at Bell Labs in New Jersey in the 1950s, experimenting with charged particles to generate very high-power microwaves in a vacuum.

“That knowledge and the movement of charged particles and the interaction of electromagnetic waves gave me a new perspective into dark matter,” Drexler said.

His interest in dark matter began in 1994 when he read an article in the New York Times.

“I love a scientific mystery,” he said.

In 2003, he resigned as CEO of Drexler Technology to complete his book on dark matter, “How Dark Matter Created Dark Energy and the Sun: An Astrophysics Detective Story (Universal, 2003).

Looking forward, Drexler is enthusiastic about a recent development with the Hubble Telescope.

“In 2008, the Hubble Telescope will be upgraded to improve its ultraviolet sensitivity,” he said.

“The telescope will be 30 times more sensitive to ultraviolet light. I’m predicting that the Hubble will observe ultraviolet light from dark matter.”