Dark energy is consistently described as a property of space itself Does this mean that in the total absence of matter the universe would still exist

Published: November 23, 2009

Cosmic recipe. Normal or “baryonic” matter (atoms) makes up about 4.6 percent of the present universe. The rest consists of about 23 percent dark matter and 72 percent dark energy.

Photo by WMAP Science Team

So space can exist without regard to what fills it. That said, it is not clear that dark energy is a "property of space."

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