Since at least the early 20th century, evidence has been gathering that some motions of
stars and galaxies are inconsistent with the expected gravitational influence of visible matter.
One of the first observed inconsistencies occurred in the 1930’s by Swiss astronomer, Fritz
Zwicky. Because of this, he coined the term “Dunkle Materie”, or dark matter, to describe the
invisible source of gravitational influence needed to explain observations of galaxy clusters. It
has been a few years shy of a century and scientists are still seeking solutions to the “dark matter
problem”. Attempted solutions range from looking for the specific dark matter particles to
tweaking Newton’s laws of gravity – or the general relativistic equivalent. This review gives an
update on scientists’ current understanding of the dark matter problem. By utilizing Newton’s
Gravitational Force equation as a framework, the reader is guided through what the problem is,
its current and most accepted solutions, and how one would go about verifying these solutions.
Because the nature and distribution of dark matter influences galaxy formation, JWST’s
observations of early galaxies may play a role in shedding light on the dark matter problem.