Galaxy filament

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In physical cosmology, galaxy filaments, also called supercluster complexes or great walls or "great attractors",[1][2] are amongst the largest known cosmic structures in the universe. They are massive, thread-like structures with a typical length of 50 to 80 megaparsecs h-1 that form the boundaries between large voids in the universe.[3] Filaments consist of gravitationally bound galaxies; parts where a large number of galaxies are very close to each other (in cosmic terms) are called superclusters.

Discoveries of structures larger than superclusters started in the 1980s. In 1987 astronomer R. Brent Tully of the University of Hawaii’s Institute of Astronomy identified what he called the Pisces-Cetus Supercluster Complex. In 1989 the CfA2 Great Wall was discovered,[4] followed by the Sloan Great Wall in 2003.[5] On January 11, 2013, it was announced that a large quasar group was discovered, the Huge-LQG, which dwarfs previously discovered galaxy filaments in size.[6]

In 2006, scientists announced the discovery of three filaments aligned to form one of the largest structures known to humanity,[7] composed of densely packed galaxies and enormous blobs of gas known as Lyman-alpha blobs.[8]

Contents

List [edit]

Galaxy filaments [edit]

Filament subtype of filaments have roughly similar major and minor axes in cross-section, along the lengthwise axis.

Filaments of Galaxies
Filament Date Mean Distance Dimension Notes
Coma Filament The Coma Supercluster lies within the Coma Filament.[9] It forms part of the CfA2 Great Wall.[10]
Perseus-Pegasus Filament 1985 Connected to the Pisces-Cetus Supercluster, with the Perseus-Pisces Supercluster being a member of the filament.[11]
Ursa Major Filament Connected to the CfA Homunculus, a portion of the filament forms a portion of the "leg" of the Homunculus.[12]
Lynx-Ursa Major Filament (LUM Filament) 1999 from 2000 km/s to 8000 km/s in redshift space Connected to and separate from the Lynx-Ursa Major Supercluster.[12]
z=2.38 filament around protocluster ClG J2143-4423 2004 z=2.38 110Mpc A filament the length of the Great Wall was discovered in 2004. As of 2008, it was still the largest structure beyond redshift 2.[13][14][15][16]

Galaxy walls [edit]

The Galaxy wall subtype of filaments have a significantly greater major axis than minor axis in cross-section, along the lengthwise axis.

Walls of Galaxies
Wall Date Mean Distance Dimension Notes
CfA2 Great Wall (Coma Wall, Great Wall, Northern Great Wall, Great Northern Wall, CfA Great Wall) 1989 z=0.03058 251Mpc long
750 Mly long
250 Mly wide
20 Mly thick
 This was the first super-large large-scale structure or pseudo-structure in the universe to be discovered. The CfA Homunculus lies at the heart of the Great Wall, and the Coma Supercluster forms most of the homunculus structure. The Coma Cluster lies at the core.[17][18]
Sloan Great Wall (SDSS Great Wall) 2005 z=0.07804 433Mpc long This was the largest known structure or pseudo-structure to be discovered[17] until it was eclipsed by the Huge-LQG large quasar group found eight years later.
Sculptor Wall (Southern Great Wall, Great Southern Wall, Southern Wall) 8000 km/s long
5000 km/s wide
1000 km/s deep
(in redshift space dimensions)		 The Sculptor Wall is "parallel" to the Fornax Wall and "perpendicular" to the Grus Wall.[19][20]
Grus Wall The Grus Wall is "perpendicular" to the Fornax and Sculptor Walls.[20]
Fornax Wall The Fornax Cluster is part of this wall. The wall is "parallel" to the Sculptor Wall and "perpendicular" to the Grus Wall.[19][20]
  • A wall has been proposed, in 2000, to lie at z=1.47 in the vicinity of radio galaxy B3 0003+387.[22]

Large Quasar Groups [edit]

Large quasar groups (LQGs) are some of the largest structures known.[25] They are theorized to be protohyperclusters/proto-supercluster-complexes/galaxy filament precursors.[26]

Large Quasar Groups
LQG Date Mean Distance Dimension Notes
Clowes & Campusano LQG
(U1.28 , CCLQG)		 1991
Huge-LQG 2012 z=1.27
  • characteristic size: 500 Mpc
  • longest dimension: 1240 Mpc
 It is the largest structure known in the universe, as of January 2013.

[25][26]

Map of nearest galaxy walls [edit]

The Universe within 500 million Light Years, showing the nearest galaxy walls

Maps of large-scale distribution [edit]

  • The universe within 1 billion light-years (307 Mpc) of Earth, showing local superclusters forming filaments and voids.

  • Map of nearest walls, voids and superclusters.

  • 2dF survey map, containing the SDSS Great Wall

  • 2MASS XSC infrared sky map

See also [edit]

References [edit]

  1. ^ R.G.Clowes; "Large Quasar Groups - A Short Review"; 'The New Era of Wide Field Astronomy', ASP Conference Series, Vol. 232.; 2001; Astronomical Society of the Pacific; ISBN 1-58381-065-X ; Bibcode: 2001ASPC..232..108C
  2. ^ Boris V. Komberg, Andrey V. Kravtsov, Vladimir N. Lukash; "The search and investigation of the Large Groups of Quasars"; arXiv:astro-ph/9602090 ; Bibcode: 1996astro.ph..2090K ;
  3. ^ Bharadwaj, Somnath; Bhavsar, Suketu; Sheth, Jatush V. The Size of the Longest Filaments in the Universe. Astrophys.J. 606 (2004) 25-31
  4. ^ M. J. Geller & J. P. Huchra, Science 246, 897 (1989).
  5. ^ Sky and Telescope, "Refining the Cosmic Recipe", 14 November 2003
  6. ^ Wall, Mike (2013-01-11). "Largest structure in universe discovered". Fox News. 
  7. ^ http://www.universetoday.com/399/the-largest-structure-in-the-universe/
  8. ^ Than, Ker (2006-07-28). "Scientists: Cosmic blob biggest thing in universe". SPACE.com. Retrieved 2007-03-11. 
  9. ^ 'Astronomy and Astrophysics' (ISSN 0004-6361), vol. 138, no. 1, Sept. 1984, p. 85-92. Research supported by Cornell University "The Coma/A 1367 filament of galaxies" 09/1984 Bibcode: 1984A&A...138...85F
  10. ^ THE ASTRONOMICAL JOURNAL, 115:1745-1777, 1998 May ; THE STAR FORMATION PROPERTIES OF DISK GALAXIES: Hα IMAGING OF GALAXIES IN THE COMA SUPERCLUSTER
  11. ^ 'Astrophysical Journal', Part 1 (ISSN 0004-637X), vol. 299, Dec. 1, 1985, p. 5-14. "A possible 300 megaparsec filament of clusters of galaxies in Perseus-Pegasus" 12/1985 Bibcode: 1985ApJ...299....5B
  12. ^ a b 'The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series', Volume 121, Issue 2, pp. 445-472. "Photometric Properties of Kiso Ultraviolet-Excess Galaxies in the Lynx-Ursa Major Region" 04/1999 Bibcode: 1999ApJS..121..445T
  13. ^ NASA, GIANT GALAXY STRING DEFIES MODELS OF HOW UNIVERSE EVOLVED, January 7, 2004
  14. ^ 'The Astrophysical Journal', Volume 602, Issue 2, pp. 545-554. The Distribution of Lyα-Emitting Galaxies at z=2.38 02/2004 Bibcode: 2004ApJ...602..545P doi:10.1086/381145
  15. ^ 'The Astrophysical Journal', Volume 614, Issue 1, pp. 75-83. The Distribution of Lyα-emitting Galaxies at z=2.38. II. Spectroscopy 10/2004 Bibcode: 2004ApJ...614...75F doi:10.1086/423417
  16. ^ 'Relativistic Astrophysics Legacy and Cosmology - Einstein's, ESO Astrophysics Symposia', Volume . ISBN 978-3-540-74712-3. Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg, 2008, p. 358 Ultraviolet-Bright, High-Redshift ULIRGS 00/2008 Bibcode: 2008ralc.conf..358W
  17. ^ a b Chin. J. Astron. Astrophys. Vol. 6 (2006), No. 1, 35–42 Super-Large-Scale Structures in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey PDF
  18. ^ 'Scientific American', Vol. 280, No. 6, p. 30 - 37 Mapping the Universe PDF (1.43 MB) 06/1999 Bibcode: 1999SciAm.280f..30L
  19. ^ a b c Unveiling large-scale structures behind the Milky Way. Astronomical Society of the Pacific Conference Series, Vol. 67; Proceedings of a workshop at the Observatoire de Paris-Meudon; 18–21 January 1994; San Francisco: Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP); c1994; edited by Chantal Balkowski and R. C. Kraan-Korteweg, p.21 ; Visualization of Nearby Large-Scale Structures ; Fairall, A. P., Paverd, W. R., & Ashley, R. P. ; 1994ASPC...67...21F
  20. ^ a b c d 'Astrophysics and Space Science', Volume 230, Issue 1-2, pp. 225-235 Large-Scale Structures in the Distribution of Galaxies 08/1995 Bibcode: 1995Ap&SS.230..225F
  21. ^ World Science, Wall of galaxies tugs on ours, astronomers find April 19, 2006
  22. ^ 'The Astronomical Journal', Volume 120, Issue 5, pp. 2331-2337. B3 0003+387: AGN-Marked Large-Scale Structure at Redshift 1.47? 11/2000 Bibcode: 2000AJ....120.2331T doi:10.1086/316827
  23. ^ FermiLab, Astronomers Find Wall of Galaxies Traversing the Hubble Deep Field, DARPA, Monday, January 24, 2000
  24. ^ 'The Astronomical Journal', Volume 119, Issue 6, pp. 2571-2582 ; QSOS and Absorption-Line Systems surrounding the Hubble Deep Field ; 06/2000 ; doi:10.1086/301404 ; Bibcode: 2000AJ....119.2571V ;
  25. ^ a b ScienceDaily, "Biggest Structure in Universe: Large Quasar Group Is 4 Billion Light Years Across", Royal Astronomical Society, 11 January 2013 (accessed 13 January 2013)
  26. ^ a b Clowes, Roger G.; Harris, Kathryn A.; Raghunathan, Srinivasan; Campusano, Luis E.; Soechting, Ilona K.; Graham, Matthew J.; "A structure in the early universe at z ~ 1.3 that exceeds the homogeneity scale of the R-W concordance cosmology"; arXiv:1211.6256 ; Bibcode: 2012arXiv1211.6256C ; doi:10.1093/mnras/sts497 ; Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 11 January 2013

Further reading [edit]

External links [edit]
Morphology
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See also
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