The Gruber Foundation, a Type 1 supporting organization operated and supervised by Yale University, has announced the recipients of the 2020 Gruber Cosmology Prize.

The annual prize honors leading cosmologists, astronomers, astrophysicists, or scientific philosophers for theoretical, analytical, conceptual or observational discoveries leading to fundamental advances in our understanding of the universe. This year's recipients are Lars Hernquist (Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian) and Volker Springel (Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics), who will split the $500,000 award for their defining contributions to cosmological simulations, a method that tests existing theories of the formation of cosmological structures at every scale, including stars, galaxies, and the universe itself.

Cosmological simulations begin with traditional sources of data and, through a combination of theory and known physics thought to approximate initial conditions, recreate the processes that could have led to the current structure of galaxies and the universe. By comparing the properties of the simulations to actual observations, the validity of the model can be tested. In addition to their work on simulations, the prize also recognizes several numerical algorithms and community codes written by Hernquist and Springel that cosmologists consider indispensable. In the words of one Gruber Prize nominator, the two men have forged "one of the most productive collaborations ever in cosmology."