J. Richard Gott III, Mario Jurić, David Schlegel, Fiona Hoyle, Michael Vogeley, Max Tegmark, Neta Bahcall, Jon Brinkmann
A Map of the Universe
(Submitted on 20 Oct 2003 (v1), last revised 17 Oct 2005 (this version, v2))
We have produced a new conformal map of the universe illustrating recent discoveries, ranging from Kuiper belt objects in the Solar system, to the galaxies and quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. This map projection, based on the logarithm map of the complex plane, preserves shapes locally, and yet is able to display the entire range of astronomical scales from the Earth’s neighborhood to the cosmic microwave background. The conformal nature of the projection, preserving shapes locally, may be of particular use for analyzing large scale structure. Prominent in the map is a Sloan Great Wall of galaxies 1.37 billion light years long, 80% longer than the Great Wall discovered by Geller and Huchra and therefore the largest observed structure in the universe.
Journal reference: Astrophys.J.624:463,2005
DOI: 10.1086/428890
Cite as: arXiv:astro-ph/0310571v2