ACADEMIA

• The quantum simulations performed in the CESGA groups of the CSIC, provide fundamental data for the study of the information obtained through the Space Observatory “Herschel” or ALMA radio telescopes project.

• Through models of evolution of the Universe, Molecular Astrophysics and the Astrobiology, researchers study the cycle of the biological molecules that give rise to the life.

 The Space Observatory 'Herschel', which orbits between the Earth and the Sun, and the network of radio telescopes ALMA of Atacama (Chile) are some of the modern scientific installations that now provide huge quantities of data to help us to know better the Universe and our own planet.

Analysis of this data is as important as obtaining it and supplying it to many scientific teams, including the researcher Roncero Octavio Villa who heads the Institute for Fundamental Physics (IFF) of the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC), explains his works with the capacity of calculation of the Centre of Supercomputación of Galicia (CESGA).

The detection of the spectra of microwaves and infrared satellite 'Herschel' and 66 ALMA radio telescopes allow the study molecules in interstellar space, the chemical composition of planetary and stellar atmospheres as well as the surface of comets, planets and satellites. This provides information of great interest to determine the formation of galaxies in the early universe and its evolution or the formation of molecules and biomolecules, among others. This will increase scientific knowledge in areas such as star formation after the Big Bang, the 'Big Bang' that gave birth to the Universe, and the formation of stars and planets in the process of birth. These large scientific projects, says Octavio Roncero, enable us to "detect molecules and their abundance in interstellar clouds and planetary atmospheres, but we need to know its behavior in collisions with other molecules or ions or after absorption of photons to model its evolution."

This requires modeling of dynamic processes of radical species that "live" shortly and are difficult to characterize in the laboratory experimental conditions. Thus, atomic hydrogen, molecular and ionic is of fundamental importance since it is the most abundant element in the universe, and collisional and radiative processes involved in the hydrogen must be studied by quantum simulations, which require supercomputers such as Finis Terrae at CESGA.

In these simulations, the CSIC researcher indicates, "the data obtained is extremely useful" to be used by molecular astrophysicists to study the large amount of information available through the 'Herschel' or ALMA project for ten years and cost many millions of euros. "

Thus, to better describe the behavior of certain ionic species and molecular hydrogen "requires knowledge of the collisional processes and radiative in which they are involved," which would serve to take them like probes in the study of, for example the ion H3 +, of ionospheres and interstellar clouds. The aim is to put a brick in the knowledge of the molecular training course from the Big Bang to the present day, providing data for modeling Molecular evolution of the universe to the formation of biological molecules that give rise to life, which addresses the emerging field of astrobiology.

But their analysis requires a large computing power, using quantum mechanical methods to study the behavior of a few atoms-which could be considered as "a trivial process" - is required to simulate what happens "in the billions of points multidimensional spaces." That's where comes in the computing power of the supercomputer 'Finis Terrae' CESGA, that Roncero and his team emply for their work.

For greater information can contact with Octavio Roncero Villa at: 91 5616800 ext. 941124