Astronomers run some of the largest simulations on the world's most powerful supercomputers. These simulations trace the formation of galaxies and cosmic structures on scales of billions of light years from shortly after the Big Bang to the present day. In this talk, Dr. Lange will discuss why astronomers are running these large-scale simulations that consume petabytes of data and require millions of CPU hours. He will also speak about what these simulations have revealed about our Universe and how they have become an invaluable tool for helping us understand dark matter and dark energy.

Dr. Johannes Lange is a postdoctoral researcher at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC). Born in East Berlin, he has studied physics and astronomy at various places in the world, including Europe, Asia, and the US. He obtained his Ph.D. from Yale University before joining KIPAC as a Stanford-Santa Cruz Cosmology Fellow. He uses cosmological simulations to study the large-scale distribution of matter in the Universe to further our understanding of cosmology and galaxies. He is a member of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) survey, which will provide the most detailed three-dimensional map of the Universe to date. Johannes also loves to share his excitement about astronomy with the general public and has given numerous presentations at schools, observatories, universities, and local venues.