for his contributions to understanding structure formation in the Universe. With powerful numerical simulations he has shown how small density fluctuations in the early Universe develop into galaxies and other nonlinear structures, strongly supporting a cosmology with a flat geometry, and dominated by dark matter and a cosmological constant.
The Shaw Prize in Astronomy for 2017 is awarded to Simon D M White, Director of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Germany, for his contributions to understanding structure formation in the Universe. With powerful numerical simulations he has shown how small density fluctuations in the early Universe develop into galaxies and other nonlinear structures, strongly supporting a cosmology with a flat geometry, and dominated by dark matter and a cosmological constant.
Perhaps the most important recent result in cosmology is the development of a cosmological standard model that explains a remarkable variety of observational phenomena in the Universe. In this model, small initial fluctuations in density existed near the Big Bang, perhaps generated via quantum fluctuations. Between that time and the present, 13.8 billion years later, these small fluctuations developed into the rich observed structure that characterizes the current Universe: galaxies with a wide range of sizes, masses, luminosities, and appearance; groups and gigantic clusters of galaxies, and a vast, complex cosmic web of gas and galaxies connecting the largest clusters. The evolution of this cosmic structure is determined in principle by the well-known laws of gravity, hydrodynamics, and relativity; but solving these equations has been an immense challenge.
Perhaps the most important recent result in cosmology is the development of a cosmological standard model that explains a remarkable variety of observational phenomena in the Universe. In this model, small initial fluctuations in density existed near the Big Bang, perhaps generated via quantum fluctuations. Between that time and the present, 13.8 billion years later, these small fluctuations developed into the rich observed structure that characterizes the current Universe: galaxies with a wide range of sizes, masses, luminosities, and appearance; groups and gigantic clusters of galaxies, and a vast, complex cosmic web of gas and galaxies connecting the largest clusters. The evolution of this cosmic structure is determined in principle by the well-known laws of gravity, hydrodynamics, and relativity; but solving these equations has been an immense challenge.
Over the past four decades Simon White, together with an exceptional group of collaborators and students, has developed N-body computer simulations as a new tool of extraordinary power, yielding fundamental insights into cosmic structure formation. The recent “Millennium simulation” captures with great precision the time evolution of cosmic structure between 10 million years after the Big Bang to the present, with over 10,000 million particles representing dark matter distributed in a cube of 2.2 billion light years on a side. In post-processing of this simulation, White, Springel and their colleagues also added models of the small-scale physical processes that govern the evolution of normal matter within the dark matter halos. The formation of stars in galaxies results from a competition between gas cooling and the ejection of matter from the galaxies through the action of supernovae and massive black holes. These semianalytic methods were first proposed by White and Frenk in 1991, and their current predictions for galaxy properties match a remarkable variety of observations, such that such simulations are beginning to approach the age-old dream of “creating the Universe in a computer”.
Simon D M White was born in 1951 in Ashford, Kent, UK and is currently the Director at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Germany. He received his BA degree in Mathematics and his PhD in Astronomy from the University of Cambridge, UK in 1972 and 1977 respectively. He was a Lindemann Fellow at the University of California (UC), Berkeley, USA (1977–1978) and Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge (1979–1980). He then returned to UC Berkeley as Adjunct Assistant Professor (1981–1984). He joined the University of Arizona, USA, where he was successively Associate Professor/Astronomer (1984–1987) and Professor/Astronomer (1987–1991) at the Steward Observatory. He served as Director at the European Association for Research in Astronomy from 1992 to 1994. Since 1994, he has been a Director of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics. He is also a Foreign Member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, a Member of the German National Academy, Leopoldina and a Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences. His many awards include, most recently, the 2011 Gruber Prize in Cosmology and the 2017 Shaw Prize in Astronomy.
Professor White is an astrophysicist who has made important contributions to the fascinating study of the evolution of galaxies. He is also known for his work on dark matter. His computer simulations have led to the standard model of growth of structure in the Universe. He was first to show that when two galaxies merge, the final product is similar to an elliptical galaxy. With Martin Rees, he proposed that galaxy formation was caused by gas condensing at the centres of dark halos. With other colleagues, he pioneered supercomputer simulations of cosmic structure formation, showing that our Universe appears to be dominated by cold dark matter.
