# Cosmography and Data Visualization

## TL;DR

This paper discusses advancements in extragalactic cosmography using 3D visualization techniques with SDvision, aiding in understanding the universe's structure, galaxy flows, and cosmic features like the Great Attractor and Laniakea.

## Contribution

It introduces novel visualization methods applied to diverse cosmic data, enhancing comprehension of large-scale universe structures and dynamics.

## Key findings

- Mapping of the local universe structure
- Identification of the boundaries of Laniakea
- Insights into galaxy flows and attractors

## Abstract

Cosmography, the study and making of maps of the universe or cosmos, is a field where visual representation benefits from modern three-dimensional visualization techniques and media. At the extragalactic distance scales, visualization is contributing in understanding the complex structure of the local universe, in terms of spatial distribution and flows of galaxies and dark matter. In this paper, we report advances in the field of extragalactic cosmography obtained using the SDvision visualization software in the context of the Cosmicflows Project. Here, multiple visualization techniques are applied to a variety of data products: catalogs of galaxy positions and galaxy peculiar velocities, reconstructed velocity field, density field, gravitational potential field, velocity shear tensor viewed in terms of its eigenvalues and eigenvectors, envelope surfaces enclosing basins of attraction. These visualizations, implemented as high-resolution images, videos, and interactive viewers, have contributed to a number of studies: the cosmography of the local part of the universe, the nature of the Great Attractor, the discovery of the boundaries of our home supercluster of galaxies Laniakea, the mapping of the cosmic web, the study of attractors and repellers.