X-Ray Telescopes Reveal an Inconceivable Object: A Superstructure That Spans More Than a Billion Light-Years

Nearly one-third of the galaxies in the universe are organized into five massive structures of unimaginable scale. Astronomers recently discovered the largest of these structures, which they’ve named Quipu. Spanning more than a billion light-years, Quipu is the largest superstructure ever discovered.

A supercluster named Quipu. This galactic supercluster measures more than 1.3 billion light-years (over 400 megaparsecs) across. Additionally, it has an estimated mass of 2 × 10¹⁷ solar masses, making it about 200 quadrillion times more massive than the Sun.

The colossal structure has been named Quipu in honor of the Inca system of knotted cords. The Incas used to weave wool threads by tying knots in various ways to count or convey messages. Similarly, scientists are beginning to decipher the intricate filaments and connections present in these cosmic superstructures.

The cosmic web of matter. The Milky Way is part of the Local Group, which includes our neighboring Andromeda Galaxy, the Triangulum Galaxy, and numerous satellite galaxies. The Local Group is itself part of a larger collection of clusters known as the Virgo Supercluster.

Meanwhile, the Virgo Supercluster is contained within an enormous filamentary structure called Laniakea, which encompasses around 100,000 galaxies and spans 520 million light-years. As you increase the scale of observation, you can see that the universe’s matter is intricately woven into a cosmic web that astronomers are working to map.

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Scientists Thought the Milky Way Was Part of Laniakea. It Turns Out That an Even Larger Superstructure Controls Its Movements

Five superstructures. An international team of astronomers located in Germany, South Africa, and Spain has conducted the first global-scale study of the largest structures in the universe.

Researchers identified five particularly prominent superstructures using data from galaxy clusters observed in X-rays through the CLASSIX Cluster Survey. In addition to Quipu, they discovered Shapley, Serpens-Corona Borealis, Hercules, and Sculptor-Pegasus.

These five superstructures collectively account for around 30% of the galaxies and 25% of the matter in the universe, occupying 13% of the total volume. Their small lateral extensions visually resemble the knots of a quipu, which may encode crucial information about the formation and evolution of the cosmos.

The influence of Quipu. Massive concentrations of matter, like Quipu, are crucial for understanding how the fabric of the cosmos is structured. They also help explain the discrepancies between the Hubble constant, which measures the expansion of the universe, and the rate at which galaxies move apart.

Quipu’s immense mass has a significant effect on its surroundings. Its strong gravitational pull may be causing unusual motions in galaxies. It might also create distortions in the cosmic microwave background radiation, a faint residual electromagnetic signal from the Big Bang.

Image | ESA & Planck Collaboration/Rosat/Digitised Sky Survey

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