Channel: NASA's Ames Research Center

Category: Science & Technology

Tags: supercomputernasaames research centervisualizationsimulationsciencegalaxyspace

Description: This supercomputing simulation depicts the gas in and around an evolving galaxy over 13 billion years. The purple-to-yellow colors indicate the gas density, with the purple tracing lower density gas and the yellow tracing higher density gas. The blue-to-red colors indicate gas temperature, the redder colors tracing the hotter gas. The colder, denser gas flows in along cosmic filaments to form the galaxy, where stars (not shown) are forming. These stars then blow up as supernovae that drive galactic superwinds from the galaxy; these are seen predominantly as the hotter diffuse gas blowing out of the galaxy. As there is more star formation and thus more supernovae at early times, these winds become calmer as the galaxy evolves. This visualization shows data from the Figuring Out Gas and Galaxies in Enzo project, known as FOGGIE, run on NASA’s Pleiades supercomputer by researchers at the Space Telescope Science Institute from Johns Hopkins University. Enzo is a specialized computing code used in astrophysics. Video credit: Johns Hopkins University/Molly Peeples; NASA Ames/Timothy Sandstrom Learn more: nasa.gov/image-feature/ames/illuminating-gas-between-galaxies NASA's Ames Research Center is located in California's Silicon Valley. Follow us on social media to hear about the latest developments in space, science, technology and aeronautics. Facebook facebook.com/nasaames Twitter twitter.com/nasaames Instagram instagram.com/nasaames