III. Ecosmos: A Revolutionary Fertile, Habitable, Solar-Bioplanet, Incubator Lifescape

B. Our Whole Scale EcosmoVerse Description Project

Ji, Zhiyuan and Mauro Giavalisco. Reconstructing the Assembly of Massive Galaxies. II. Galaxies Develop Dense Stellar Cores as They Evolve toward Quiescence at Cosmic Noon. arXiv:2208.04325. We choose this entry by UM Amherst astronomers among many studies across the 21st century universe frontier for its exemplary content as worldwise explorers go forward with a seemingly innate, unlimited capability. Again how fantastic is it that we peoples can explore, reconstruct and quantify such wide and deep celestial realms, as if performing, unawares as yet, some intended Ecosmic sapiens function of self-description and realization. See also for example Galaxy Clustering from the Bottom Up by Carolina Cuesta-Lazaro, et al at 2208.05218.

I also wish to record that living a few miles away, for many years I have attended the Astronomy department weekly lecture symposium with presenters such as Debra Fischer (Yale), Fred Adams (U. Michigan), Tom Arny (UM), Anna Frebel (MIT), Nick Cowan (McGill) and many more.

We use the SED-fitting code Prospector to reconstruct the nonparametric star formation history (SFH) of massive star-forming galaxies (SFGs) and quiescent galaxies (QGs) at redshift to investigate the joint evolution of galactic star-formation activity and structural properties. We find significant correlations between the SFH and their morphology. We discuss possible physical scenarios for the observed evolution and find that our empirical constraints are in good quantitative agreement with the model predictions. (Excerpt)

Keeley, Ryan, et al. Reconstructing the UniVerse. arXiv:2010.03234. We cite this entry by five astrophysicists with postings in Korea, China and Mexico because its auspicious title could well allude to the phenomenal ecosmic project that we Earthlings altogether might be now embarking upon. We test the mutual consistency between the baryon acoustic oscillation measurements from the eBOSS SDSS final release, as well as the Pantheon supernova compilation.

Kinney, Will. An Infinity of Worlds: Cosmic Inflation and the Beginning of the Universe. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2022. A veteran SUNY Buffalo physicist writes a latest theoretical survey of this apparent instant origin. A novel expansion goes on to consider a multiversal occasion.

In the beginning was the Big Bang: an unimaginably hot fire almost fourteen billion years ago in which the first elements were forged. The physical theory of the nascent universe—the Big Bang—was a most consequential development in twentieth-century science. And yet it leaves many questions unanswered. Kinney argues that cosmic inflation is a transformational idea in cosmology, changing our picture of the basic structure and raising questions about what we mean by a scientific theory. He explains that inflation is a remarkable unification of inner space and outer space, in which the physics of the very large (the cosmos) meets the physics of the very small (particles and fields), closing in a full circle at the first moment of time.

Kogut, Alan. et al.. The Primordial Inflation Explorer (PIXIE): Mission Design and Science Goals. arXiv:2405.20403. We cite this entry by seventeen astroscientists from across the USA onto the UK, France and beyond led by NASA Goddard as one instance of many ongoing worldwise endeavors to carry out what seems to be our intended participatory work of universal self-representation and affirmation.

The Primordial Inflation Explorer (PIXIE) mission concept plans to measure the energy spectrum and linear polarization of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). PIXIE opens a broad discovery space for the origin, contents, and evolution of the universe. Measurements of small distortions from a CMB blackbody spectrum provide a robust determination of the mean electron pressure and temperature in the universe while constraining processes including dissipation of primordial density perturbations, black holes, and the decay or annihilation of dark matter. We describe the PIXIE instrument sensitivity, foreground subtraction, and anticipated science return from both the baseline 2-year mission and a potential extended mission. (Excerpt)

Lahav, Ofer and Andrew Liddle. The Cosmological Parameters (2023).. arXiv:2403.15526. . University College London and university of Lisbon theorists provide a latest exemplary synopsis.

This is a review article for The Review of Particle Physics 2024 (aka the Particle Data Book), appearing as Chapter 25. It forms a compact review of knowledge of these celestial entities and their properties near the end of 2023. Topics included are Parametrizing the Universe; Extensions to the standard model; Probes; Bringing observations together; Outlook for the future.

Lawton, Graham, et al, eds. 21 Great Mysteries of the Universe. London: New Scientist Collections, 2018. We cite this popular edition because its seven sections: Early Universe (big bang, inflation), Nature of Reality (quantum, multiverse), Fabric of the Cosmos (gravitational waves, time warps), Dark Stuff (missing matter), Black Holes (dark energy), Time (dimensions), and New Directions (final theories, thermodynamics, missing mathematics) provide an authoritative and visual entry to these far frontiers. For example, Quantum Thermodynamics by Vlatko Vedral, and The Many Faces of the Multiverse by Robert Adler. But as one may peruse, it amazes that we human beings are altogether able to fathom and detail such infinite heights and depths. But we observant explorers ourselves are rarely factored into any overall cosmic scenario. Surely there must be some central locus, significance and co-creative destiny for these fantastic abilities.

Leclercq, Florent. Bayesian Large-Scale Structure Inference and Cosmic Web Analysis. arXiv:1512 04985. A 2015 doctoral thesis on Cosmologie at the Universite Pierre et Marie Curie with a French flair for personal and literary asides. The Acknowledgements page is graced with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s line There are all kinds of life in this world, but never the same love twice. We cite the long Abstract to convey the breadth and depth of the luminous endeavor. But the second quote from the preface avers the perennial search for and expectation of discovery and knowledge is not abandoned and still goes on.

Surveys of the cosmic large-scale structure carry opportunities for building and testing cosmological theories about the origin and evolution of the Universe. In this thesis, we present an innovative statistical approach for the ab initio simultaneous analysis of the formation history and morphology of the cosmic web: the BORG algorithm infers the primordial density fluctuations and produces physical reconstructions of the dark matter distribution that underlies observed galaxies, by assimilating the survey data into a cosmological structure formation model. The method, based on Bayesian probability theory, provides accurate means of uncertainty quantification. We demonstrate the application of BORG to the Sloan Digital Sky Survey data and describe the primordial and late-time large-scale structure in the observed volume. We show how the approach has led to the first quantitative inference of the cosmological initial conditions and of the formation history of the observed structures. In particular, we build an enhanced catalog of cosmic voids probed at the level of the dark matter distribution, deeper than with the galaxies. We present detailed probabilistic maps of the dynamic cosmic web, and offer a general solution to the problem of classifying structures in the presence of uncertainty. The results described in this thesis constitute accurate chrono-cosmography of the inhomogeneous cosmic structure. (Abstract)

In my experience, the loneliness felt by some researchers is easily overcome in our field by a simple thought: a cosmologist’s quest is the quest of all humanity. This is why, I believe, cosmology resonates with people all around the world well beyond professional scientists, in different places and cultures. It touches everybody intellectually, but also emotionally and spiritually, without prejudice. As probability theory says something about how our mind works, physical cosmology tells us how we can think of ourselves as a species. I would like to quote Paulo Coelho’s prologue to The Alchemist (1988). When Narcissus falls into the lake and dies, the lake weeps, and declares: “I weep for Narcissus, but I never noticed that Narcissus was beautiful. I weep because, each time he knelt beside my banks, I could see, in the depths of his eyes, my own beauty reflected.” When we look into the deep Universe, the Universe also may be looking deeply into us. (vii)

Lian, Jianhui, et al. The broken-exponential radial structure and larger size of the Milky Way galaxy.. Nature Astronomy. June, 2024. We enter this work by Yunan University, University of Utah, and University of St Andrews for its content and in philoSophia wonder at the whole scenario whence at later date a minute, rare bioworld evolves a collective intellect which can then be able to retrospectively study, achieve and transcribe an extensive, integral galactic knowledge. See also, for example, The mass-metallicity relation as a ruler for galaxy evolution: insights from the James Webb Space Telescope at arXiv:2408.00061.

The radial structure of a galaxy is a fundamental property that reflects its growth and assembly history. Although it is straightforward to measure that of external galaxies, it is challenging for the Milky Way because of our inside perspective. The radial structure of the Milky Way has been assumed to be shaped by a single-exponential disk and a central bulge component. Here we report (1) a measurement of the age-resolved Galactic surface brightness profile and (2) the corresponding size of the Milky Way in terms of a half-light radius. Our results suggest that the Milky Way has a more complex radial structure and larger size than previously expected. (Excerpt)

Libeskind, Noam and Brent Tully. Our Place in the Cosmos. Scientific American. July, 2016. Streams of galaxies flowing through space reveal the contours of a structure known as Laniakea, which contains our own Milky Way as well as 100,000 other large galaxies. captions an opening image for this popular view by Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics, Potsdam, and University of Hawaii scientists. Tully is a veteran authority on galactic groupings, and in 2014 identified with colleagues this supercluster (Laniakea is Hawaiian for “immense heaven”). A two page spread shows a 3D depiction of clusters of galaxies as they tend to bunch together. One is ever amazed that sapient creatures over a minute watery bioworld can suddenly be able to quantify and depict such vistas. Our phrase Cosmo Sapiens, which seems to have gained public usage, is apt for we human peoples may indeed serve a cosmic purpose as the way to achieve a vital self-description and affirmation. See also Comparing Cosmic Web Classifiers Using Information Theory by Florent Leclercq, et al at arXiv:1606.06758 for more galactical geographics.

Libeskind, Noam, et al. Tracing the Cosmic Web. arXiv:1705.03021. While a curious tendency of stars and galaxies to gather into networked forms has long been noticed, here 30 member astrophysicist team with postings in Germany, the Netherlands, UK, Columbia, USA, Chile, Mexico, France, Argentina, Israel, Spain, Norway, Poland, Italy, Australia including Mark Neyrinck, Bridget Falck, and Miguel Aragon-Calvo provide a sophisticated scientific qualification. As a result, as everywhere else such as genomes, brains and societies, webwork interlinked structures are evident across the celestial raiment. They are as innately real as all the nodal stellar objects, which needed to be found first. See also The Cosmic Spiderweb: Equivalence of Cosmic, Architectural, and Origami Tessellations (1710.04509) and The Universe as a Cellular System (1409.8661) by some group members. A companion group volume is The Zeldovich Universe: Genesis and Growth of the Cosmic Web (Cambridge UP, 2016). A 2016 book The Cosmic Web by astrophysicist Richard Gott offers another take.

On Megaparsec scales the matter and galaxy distribution is not uniform, but defines an intricate multi-scale inter-connected network which is known as the cosmic web. It represents the fundamental spatial organization of matter on scales of a few up to a hundred Megaparsec. Galaxies, intergalactic gas and dark matter arrange themselves in a salient wispy pattern of dense compact clusters, long elongated filaments, and sheetlike tenuous walls surrounding near-empty void regions. Ubiquitous throughout the entire observable Universe, such patterns exist at nearly all epochs, albeit at smaller scales. It defines a complex spatial pattern of intricately connected structures, displaying a rich geometry with multiple morphologies and shapes. This complexity is considerably enhanced by its intrinsic multiscale nature, including objects over a considerable range of spatial scales and densities. (1705.03021, 1)

Cellular systems are observed everywhere in nature, from crystal domains in metals, soap froth and cucumber cells to the network of cosmological voids. Surprisingly, despite their disparate scale and origin all cellular systems follow certain scaling laws relating their geometry, topology and dynamics. Using a cosmological N-body simulation we found that the Cosmic Web, the largest known cellular system, follows the same scaling relations seen elsewhere in nature. The dynamics of cellular systems can be used to interpret local observations such as the local velocity anomaly as the result of a collapsing void in our cosmic backyard. Moreover, scaling relations depend on the curvature of space, providing an independent measure of geometry. (1409.8661 Abstract)

On megaparsec scales, matter and galaxies have aggregated into a complex network of interconnected filaments, wall-like structures and compact clusters surrounded by large near-empty void regions. Dubbed the 'Cosmic Web', theoretical and observational studies have led to its recognition as a key aspect of structure in the Universe, representing a universal phase in the gravitationally driven emergence and evolution of cosmic structure. IAU Symposium 308 marked the centenary of the birth of the Russian physicist and cosmologist Yakov B. Zeldovich (1914-87), who was instrumental in the development of this view of structure formation. His seminal work paved the way towards an understanding of the complex web-like structure observed in our Universe. (Book)

Linder, Eric. Isogrowth Cosmology (How to Map the Universe). arXiv:2204.09071. The UC Berkeley astrophysicist casts back to 20th century findings about galactic, supernova, dark energy phenomena so to now view an ever-unfolding state of the Universe as an Earthuman intellect achieves such scientific perceptions and spacescape explorations. While Ferdinand Magellan (1480-1521) and Gerardus Mercator (1512-1594) once set out to circle and depict our round planet, some five centuries later our global sapiensphere continues this innate endeavor across the celestial raiment.

While general relativity ties together the cosmic expansion history and growth history of large scale structure, beyond the standard model these can have independent behaviors. We derive expressions for cosmologies with identical growth histories but different expansion histories, or other deviations. This provides a relation for isogrowth cosmologies, but also highlights in general the need for observations to measure each of the growth, expansion, gravity, and dark matter property histories. (Abstract)

In Section II (Cosmic Growth History) we derive the relations for isogrowth cosmology, and in Section III investigate three subcases where certain aspects of the physics have freedom while fixing others (i.e. the matter, gravity, and expansion behaviors). We discuss the use of isogrowth cosmology as a clear demonstration of freedoms and connections, and conclude with the general vision of mapping all four histories, in Section IV. (1) The mapping of all these histories through cosmological observations should be a central part of the vision for understanding our universe in the next two decades. (4)

Mandel, Ilya, ed.. Encyclopedia of Astrophysics.. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2025. This copious volume edited by a Monash University astro-authority is expected by September 25. Several entries have already been posted on the arXiv.com preprint site.

Encyclopedia of Astrophysics will be a comprehensive reference work consisting of with some 150 articles, overseen by an editorial board of veteran astrophysicists. With a logical template binding all chapters, with main sections, such as: Cosmology: Big Bang, dark matter, dark energy, CMB, lensing, general relativity; Galaxies: morphology, galaxy zoo, AGN, star formation, chemical evolution, ISM; Stars: stellar evolution, the Sun, asteroseismology; and (Exo)planets: Solar system, comets / meteors, dynamics, observations, transits.

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