Precision Cosmology Using the Lyman Alpha Forest

A 2006 INCITE Project

This project, led by Michael Norman of the University of California, San Diego, was awarded 1 million processor-hours and is aimed at the cosmological goal of precisely measuring the cosmological parameters that describe the shape, matter-energy contents, and expansion history of our universe. The project seeks to increase our understanding of the dark energy and dark matter thought to make up more than nine-tenths of our universe. Recent astronomical observations indicate important inferences about the nature of dark energy and dark matter. The examination of the absorption spectra of high redshift quasars has emerged as an important tool in this inference, since it samples matter fluctuations in the intergalactic gas. This project will achieve greater understanding by high resolution hydrodynamical cosmological simulations of the structure of the high redshift intergalactic medium.