AMNH Astrophysics Research Spotlight - The Fate of the Milky Way
Milky Way - Andromeda merger at 3.1Gyr. Click on the above image to view the full image.
Milky Way - Andromeday merger at 4.2Gyr. Click on the above image to view the full image.The simulation from which this image was rendered follows the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies for over 5 billion years, starting with their current positions, and following their evolution as they fall toward each other and eventually collide to form an elliptical galaxy. The galaxies are shown here at times of 3.1 billion years and 4.2 billion years after the present day.
The simulation uses a total of 1.65 million particles, with half being gas and the other half being stars and dark matter. Stars are visualized, while gas is used for extinction, tracing the dust lanes in the galaxies. Young globular star clusters and their accompanying ionized hydrogen regions are shown as red dots.
The simulation was performed by Yuexing Li & Mordecai-Mark Mac Low (American Museum of Natural History) and John Dubinski (U Toronto) on the Pittsburgh Supercomputer Center's Terascale Computing System, using the SPH code GADGET written by Volker Springel (MPI for Astrophysics) and collaborators, and the image was rendered by Erik Wesselak & Carter Emmart (AMNH). This simulation will be incorporated into the next Space Show of the Hayden Planetarium at the AMNH, with expected audience of approximately a million visitors per year. Support for the research was provided by the NSF Extragalactic Astronomy program.
Last modified 2005-07-01 12:53
