Sci-Tech

The largest "virtual universe" has been successfully constructed to date

2026-04-24   

On the 23rd, an international research team led by Chinese scientists officially released the first batch of research results of the ultra large scale cosmological simulation project "Qianyan". This largest virtual universe to date, constructed by supercomputers, has a side length of approximately 12 billion light-years and tracks the trajectories of about 4.2 trillion dark matter particles. It is the first to depict the panoramic evolution of the universe's structure over billions of years with ultra-high precision, and is hailed by the academic community as a "digital guide map" for exploring the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy. The "Qianyan" simulation was launched shortly after the Big Bang, and by calculating the gravitational interactions between matter, it gradually reconstructed how dark matter gathered into dark halos and the vast fibrous network of the universe. Simulations not only capture snapshots of over 100 stages of cosmic evolution, but also generate observational images of virtual galaxies' luminosity, color, and even simulations using galaxy formation models. ”Wang Qiao, a researcher at the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said, "This means that scientists can directly compare the 'appearance' of the virtual universe with the photos of the real sky taken by large telescopes, so as to test the reliability of existing cosmological theories." As a key bridge connecting theory and observation, "Qianyan" will provide important support for the research of a series of major scientific issues. Wang Qiao stated that the simulated data will directly serve international large-scale survey projects such as the China Space Station Survey Telescope and the European Space Agency's Euclid Space Telescope, helping astronomers accurately identify the impact of dark matter and dark energy on the formation of cosmic structures from massive observation signals. International peers have given high praise to this achievement. Professor Mike Boylan Corchin from the University of Texas at Austin called "Qianyan" a computational miracle, stating that it has unprecedented coverage in simulating volume and mass resolution, and is a landmark achievement in the fields of galaxy formation and cosmology research. Professor Volker Springer, director of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Germany, said that the simulation "redefines the level that numerical cosmology can reach" and its powerful statistical power enables scientists to conduct new high-precision tests on the standard cosmological model. In terms of specific scientific verification, the research team compared the complex merging galaxy cluster "Abel 2744" located about 4 billion light-years away from Earth. It was found that even though the internal dynamics of the galaxy cluster are active and the environment is extremely complex, the simulation predictions of "Qianyan" based on the standard cosmological model are still highly consistent with the actual observations of the James Webb Space Telescope. The relevant research paper has been officially published in the international journal "Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society" recently. (New Society)

Edit:Momo Responsible editor:Chen zhaozhao

Source:Science and Technology Daily

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