A new estimator of the local density of dark energy is suggested which comes from the virial theorem for non-relativistic gravitating systems embedded in the uniform dark energy background.
Dark energy must be taken into account to estimate more reliably the amount of dark matter and how it is distributed in the local universe. For systems several Mpc across like the Local Group, we introduce three self-consistent independent mass estim
ators. These account for the antigravity effect of dark energy treated as Einsteins cosmological constant Lambda. The first is a modified Kahn-Woltjer model which gives a value of the Local Group mass via the particular motions of the two largest members, the Milky Way and M31. Inclusion of dark energy in this model increases the minimum mass estimate by a factor of three compared to the classical estimate. The increase is less but still significant for different ways of using the timing argument. The second estimator is a modified virial theorem which also demonstrates how dark energy can hide from detection a part of the gravitating mass of the system. The third is a new zero-gravity method which gives an upper limit to the group mass which we calculate with high precision HST observations. In combination, the estimators lead to a robust and rather narrow range for a groups mass, M. For the Local Group, 3.2 < M < 3.7 x 10^{12} M_sun. Our result agrees well with the Millennium Simulation based on the LambdaCDM cosmology.
