Using colossal computing power, physicists have modeled how dark matter and dark energy affect how galaxies form in the universe.
A fantastically detailed simulation of the universe fits on a 100 TB hard drive - now it will cost about $ 40,000
Astronomy is a little different from many sciences because the sample size is always one. Space contains everything that we can observe in the universe, and therefore astronomers cannot, for example, study several different universes to see how ours works. However, they can create computer models of the universe. By adjusting their various parameters, astronomers can find out what role the most unusual phenomena - for example, dark matter and dark energy - play in the space around us.
However, now everyone has a way to get a copy of such a "pocket universe"
The Uchuu Simulation is the largest and most detailed simulation of the universe ever created. It contains 2.1 trillion "particles" in a space of 9.6 billion light years in diameter. Simulation simulates the evolution of the universe over 13 billion years. He does not focus on the formation of stars and planets, but instead looks at the behavior of dark matter in the expanding universe.
Uchuu's detail is high enough for the team to identify everything from galaxy clusters to individual dark matter halos. Since dark matter makes up most of the matter in the Universe, it is the main engine for the formation and clustering of galaxies.
Separate clusters of dark matter "web" at different scales
It takes enormous computing power and memory to create such a detailed model. The team used over 40,000 computer cores and 20 million computer hours to create their simulations and produced over 3 petabytes of data.
That's 3000 TB, or 3 million GB for us mortals. However, using high-density compression, the team was able to shrink the entire data down to just 100 TB. This is still a huge amount of data, but it can be stored on a single disk. For example, Nimbus's solid-state Exadrive with a similar capacity will set you back a paltry $ 40,000 - is that the price of being able to literally hide the universe in your jeans pocket?