Simulations in astronomy

Astronomers study the universe and its vast array of celestial objects, such as planets, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies, and comets.

The closest celestial object - the moon - is still 238,900 miles away from astronomers here on Earth. The farthest object - a galaxy - is more than 12 billion light years away.

When astronomers want to understand the workings of space, they often use simulations that they can run from the comfort of their own planet.

Let's explore simulations from the Khan Academy NASA content. Since the primary goal of these simulations is learning, they are simpler than the ones used by actual astronomers but still similar in topic.

This first simulation predicts a lunar eclipse based on the moon's position, incline, and rotation:

The next simulation shows the predicted results from launching a satellite to Mars on different dates of the year. NASA engineers used simulations like this to come up with launch dates for their satellites.

NASA engineers also need to figure out how to land objects onto planets. This simulation shows how tricky it is to successfully land a rover on Mars:

Cosmologists are now using computational simulations to understand the history of the entire universe and predict its future, all the way from the Big Bang to its eventual end, billions of years from now. Those simulations can test out different theories to see which simulations create universes that are the most like our own.

IllustrisTNG is a research project that simulates galaxy formation by modeling factors like gravitational attraction, magnetic fields, the flow of gases, and the presence of dark matter.${}^6$‍

This video from IllustrisTNG simulates the formation of a galaxy very similar to our Milky Way galaxy:

If a simulation can successfully output a galaxy that behaves like the Milky Way, then it may one day be able to predict the fate of our galaxy billions of years in the future.

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