English

Simulating gravitational motion, gas dynamics, and structure in the cosmos

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics 2023-06-07 v2 Astrophysics of Galaxies

Abstract

We provide introductory explanations and illustrations of the NN-body hydrodynamics code Charm N-body GrAvity solver (ChaNGa). ChaNGa simulates the gravitational motion and gas dynamics of matter in space, with the goal of modeling galactic and/or cosmological structure and evolution. We discuss the algorithm for leapfrog integration and smoothed particle hydrodynamics and computer science concepts used by the program, including the binary data structure for the particle positions. Our presentation borrows from the doctoral dissertation of J.\ G.\ Stadel. Problems are provided in order to use ChaNGa to learn or solidify some cosmological concepts.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2302.01895,
  title  = {Simulating gravitational motion, gas dynamics, and structure in the cosmos},
  author = {J. W. Powell and L. Caudill and O. Young},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2302.01895},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

Accepted by the American Journal of Physics. Two important supplementary documents are included

R2 v1 2026-06-28T08:31:35.321Z