Astronomers Discover the Largest Structure in the Universe

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Astronomers have unveiled what they believe to be the largest known structure in the universe, named "Quipu." This superstructure spans an astonishing 1.3 billion light-years, making it over 13,000 times the length of the Milky Way, as reported by Live Science. Quipu was identified among data analyses that also revealed four additional massive structures.

This discovery challenges the previous titleholder, the Hercules-Corona Borealis Great Wall, which itself extends 10 billion light-years but remains a subject of contention in the scientific community. According to a study published on the preprint site ArXiv, Quipu and its companions account for 45% of galaxy clusters, 30% of galaxies, and 25% of the observable universe's matter.

The researchers noted that Quipu exerts significant gravitational influence, affecting the motion of the Local Group relative to the Cosmic Microwave Background. They anticipate that while the current size of Quipu is immense, it will eventually break down into smaller, independent units as cosmic evolution continues, suggesting that these superstructures are transient in nature.

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