The Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC) is developing two projects on the origin of galaxies and computational cosmology.
1. The origin of galaxies.
There are billions of galaxies in the universe, each made up of billions of stars. Just like a multi-ethnic population, galaxies have different shapes, sizes, ages and colours. The DIPC galaxy astrophysics group seeks to understand the phenomena that generate this diversity of features, using both supercomputer simulations and observations with large telescopes.
2. The universe in a supercomputer
Computational cosmology creates universes on computers to try to understand the cosmos. These virtual universes being developed at DIPC show us that galaxies are only a small fraction of the matter in the universe. Most of the matter is invisible and we call it "dark matter". In addition, these universes show us how galaxies are distributed differently in the cosmos, depending on the physical laws that govern it and the nature of their components.
To learn more about this project, we invite you to watch and listen to the audiovisual 'Dark matter and cosmology'. A space with chairs has been set up for viewing. It lasts 5 minutes and is narrated in Basque, Spanish and English with subtitles. It also has a window with a signoguide and a magnetic loop for people with hearing aids or cochlear implants.