the coolest video of all time

this is probably one of the coolest things i have ever seen in my life: the millenium simulation. apparently the simulation used over 10 billion particles, with a supercomputer chugging away for over a month on it.



the project's aim was to simulate the distribution of dark matter in the universe over a long time scale. this simulation tests theories of what the conditions of the universe immediately after the big bang were like. these results are then compared to modern-day observations.

important points:

• a parsec, or pc, is equal to 3.26 light years or 30 000 billion kilometers!
• a light year means that if one were travelling at the speed of light, ~30 000km/s, it would take an entire year to travel that distance. note that the velocity rockets need to escape the earth is only 11km/s, 0.036% the speed of light!
  
• a megaparsec, or Mpc, is one million parsecs, or approximately 3 million light years
• a gigaparsec, or Gpc, is one billion parsecs, or appriximately 3 billion light years
• each point of light in the video essentially represents an entire galaxy!

notice how the structure seems to repeat itself as the view zooms in? this is typical of a fractal.

of course the video wouldn't be complete without the pink floyd soundtrack. classic.