The Network behind the cosmic web

The concept of the  cosmic web, viewing the universe as a set of discrete galaxies held together  by gravity, is deeply ingrained in cosmology. Yet, little is known about the  most effective construction and the characteristics of the underlying  network. Here we explore seven network construction algorithms that use  various galaxy distributions provided by both simulations and observations.  We find that a model relying only on spatial proximity offers the best  correlations between the physical characteristics of the connected galaxies.  We show that the properties of the networks generated and from simulations  and observations are identical, unveiling a deep universality of the cosmic  web.