Evolution of the EAGLE universe

Volume rendering of a simulation from the EAGLE project (astro.ljmu.ac.uk/~astrcrai/eagle). The intensity corresponds to the density of cosmic gas, whilst colour encodes its temperature. Red roughly corresponds to 100,000 degrees Kelvin (considered 'warm' by astronomers), whilst white corresponds to 10-100 million degrees Kelvin. Gas is heated to such high temperatures by gravitational accretion shocks, and the injection of thermal energy by feedback from supernovae and black holes. The simulation volume is 25 cMpc across, with periodic boundary conditions, and was evolved with a version of the GADGET-3 TreePM-SPH code adapted specifically for Eagle. The simulation was run and visualised on the COSMA-5 supercomputer at Durham University (UK), by the EAGLE simulation collaboration. The visualisation was created by Rob Crain (LJMU) and Jim Geach (Herts) using their Typhoon toolkit.