scholarly journals The core-cusp problem revisited: ULDM vs. CDM

Author(s):  
Emily Kendall ◽  
Richard Easther

Abstract The core-cusp problem is a widely cited motivation for the exploration of dark matter models beyond standard cold dark matter. One such alternative is ultralight dark matter (ULDM), extremely light scalar particles exhibiting wavelike properties on kiloparsec scales. Astrophysically realistic ULDM halos are expected to consist of inner solitonic cores embedded in NFW-like outer halos. The presence of the solitonic core suggests that ULDM may resolve the core-cusp discrepancy associated with pure NFW halos without recourse to baryonic physics. However, it has been demonstrated that the density of ULDM halos can exceed those of comparable NFW configurations at some radii and halo masses, apparently exacerbating the problem rather than solving it. This situation arises because, although solitonic cores are flat at their centres, they obey an inverse mass–radius scaling relationship. Meanwhile, the mass of the inner soliton increases with the total halo mass, and therefore the inner core becomes more peaked at large halo masses. We describe a parameterisation of the radial density profiles of ULDM halos that allows for environmental variability of the core–halo mass relation in order to investigate this issue in more detail. For halos up to $10^{12} {\rm M}_\odot$ , we find feasible ULDM profiles for which the central density is lower than their NFW counterparts at astrophysically accessible radii. However, comparisons to observed profiles do not strongly favour either option; both give reasonable fits to subsets of the data for some parameter choices. Consequently, we find that robust tests of the core-cusp problem in ULDM will require more comprehensive observational data and simulations that include baryonic feedback.

2021 ◽  
Vol 502 (2) ◽  
pp. 1785-1796
Author(s):  
R A Jackson ◽  
S Kaviraj ◽  
G Martin ◽  
J E G Devriendt ◽  
A Slyz ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT In the standard ΛCDM (Lambda cold dark matter) paradigm, dwarf galaxies are expected to be dark matter-rich, as baryonic feedback is thought to quickly drive gas out of their shallow potential wells and quench star formation at early epochs. Recent observations of local dwarfs with extremely low dark matter content appear to contradict this picture, potentially bringing the validity of the standard model into question. We use NewHorizon, a high-resolution cosmological simulation, to demonstrate that sustained stripping of dark matter, in tidal interactions between a massive galaxy and a dwarf satellite, naturally produces dwarfs that are dark matter-deficient, even though their initial dark matter fractions are normal. The process of dark matter stripping is responsible for the large scatter in the halo-to-stellar mass relation in the dwarf regime. The degree of stripping is driven by the closeness of the orbit of the dwarf around its massive companion and, in extreme cases, produces dwarfs with halo-to-stellar mass ratios as low as unity, consistent with the findings of recent observational studies. ∼30 per cent of dwarfs show some deviation from normal dark matter fractions due to dark matter stripping, with 10 per cent showing high levels of dark matter deficiency (Mhalo/M⋆ < 10). Given their close orbits, a significant fraction of dark matter-deficient dwarfs merge with their massive companions (e.g. ∼70 per cent merge over time-scales of ∼3.5 Gyr), with the dark matter-deficient population being constantly replenished by new interactions between dwarfs and massive companions. The creation of these galaxies is therefore a natural by-product of galaxy evolution and their existence is not in tension with the standard paradigm.


2021 ◽  
Vol 650 ◽  
pp. A113
Author(s):  
Margot M. Brouwer ◽  
Kyle A. Oman ◽  
Edwin A. Valentijn ◽  
Maciej Bilicki ◽  
Catherine Heymans ◽  
...  

We present measurements of the radial gravitational acceleration around isolated galaxies, comparing the expected gravitational acceleration given the baryonic matter (gbar) with the observed gravitational acceleration (gobs), using weak lensing measurements from the fourth data release of the Kilo-Degree Survey (KiDS-1000). These measurements extend the radial acceleration relation (RAR), traditionally measured using galaxy rotation curves, by 2 decades in gobs into the low-acceleration regime beyond the outskirts of the observable galaxy. We compare our RAR measurements to the predictions of two modified gravity (MG) theories: modified Newtonian dynamics and Verlinde’s emergent gravity (EG). We find that the measured relation between gobs and gbar agrees well with the MG predictions. In addition, we find a difference of at least 6σ between the RARs of early- and late-type galaxies (split by Sérsic index and u − r colour) with the same stellar mass. Current MG theories involve a gravity modification that is independent of other galaxy properties, which would be unable to explain this behaviour, although the EG theory is still limited to spherically symmetric static mass models. The difference might be explained if only the early-type galaxies have significant (Mgas ≈ M⋆) circumgalactic gaseous haloes. The observed behaviour is also expected in Λ-cold dark matter (ΛCDM) models where the galaxy-to-halo mass relation depends on the galaxy formation history. We find that MICE, a ΛCDM simulation with hybrid halo occupation distribution modelling and abundance matching, reproduces the observed RAR but significantly differs from BAHAMAS, a hydrodynamical cosmological galaxy formation simulation. Our results are sensitive to the amount of circumgalactic gas; current observational constraints indicate that the resulting corrections are likely moderate. Measurements of the lensing RAR with future cosmological surveys (such as Euclid) will be able to further distinguish between MG and ΛCDM models if systematic uncertainties in the baryonic mass distribution around galaxies are reduced.


2020 ◽  
Vol 493 (1) ◽  
pp. 1361-1374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arya Farahi ◽  
Matthew Ho ◽  
Hy Trac

ABSTRACT Cold dark matter model predicts that the large-scale structure grows hierarchically. Small dark matter haloes form first. Then, they grow gradually via continuous merger and accretion. These haloes host the majority of baryonic matter in the Universe in the form of hot gas and cold stellar phase. Determining how baryons are partitioned into these phases requires detailed modelling of galaxy formation and their assembly history. It is speculated that formation time of the same mass haloes might be correlated with their baryonic content. To evaluate this hypothesis, we employ haloes of mass above $10^{14}\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$ realized by TNG300 solution of the IllustrisTNG project. Formation time is not directly observable. Hence, we rely on the magnitude gap between the brightest and the fourth brightest halo galaxy member, which is shown that traces formation time of the host halo. We compute the conditional statistics of the stellar and gas content of haloes conditioned on their total mass and magnitude gap. We find a strong correlation between magnitude gap and gas mass, BCG stellar mass, and satellite galaxies stellar mass, but not the total stellar mass of halo. Conditioning on the magnitude gap can reduce the scatter about halo property–halo mass relation and has a significant impact on the conditional covariance. Reduction in the scatter can be as significant as 30 per cent, which implies more accurate halo mass prediction. Incorporating the magnitude gap has a potential to improve cosmological constraints using halo abundance and allows us to gain insight into the baryon evolution within these systems.


2013 ◽  
Vol 454 ◽  
pp. 012014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Go Ogiya ◽  
Masao Mori ◽  
Yohei Miki ◽  
Taisuke Boku ◽  
Naohito Nakasato

2018 ◽  
Vol 168 ◽  
pp. 06005 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jae-Weon Lee

This is a review on the brief history of the scalar field dark matter model also known as fuzzy dark matter, BEC dark matter, wave dark matter, or ultra-light axion. In this model ultra-light scalar dark matter particles with mass m = O(10-22)eV condense in a single Bose-Einstein condensate state and behave collectively like a classical wave. Galactic dark matter halos can be described as a self-gravitating coherent scalar field configuration called boson stars. At the scale larger than galaxies the dark matter acts like cold dark matter, while below the scale quantum pressure from the uncertainty principle suppresses the smaller structure formation so that it can resolve the small scale crisis of the conventional cold dark matter model.


2019 ◽  
Vol 488 (4) ◽  
pp. 4916-4925 ◽  
Author(s):  
Magdelena Allen ◽  
Peter Behroozi ◽  
Chung-Pei Ma

ABSTRACT Most galaxies are hosted by massive, invisible dark matter haloes, yet little is known about the scatter in the stellar mass–halo mass relation for galaxies with host halo masses Mh ≤ 1011M⊙. Using mock catalogues based on dark matter simulations, we find that two observable signatures are sensitive to scatter in the stellar mass–halo mass relation even at these mass scales; i.e. conditional stellar mass functions and velocity distribution functions for neighbouring galaxies. We compute these observables for  179,373 galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) with stellar masses M* > 109 M⊙ and redshifts 0.01 < z < 0.307. We then compare to mock observations generated from the Bolshoi-Planck dark matter simulation for stellar mass–halo mass scatters ranging from 0 to 0.6 dex. The observed results are consistent with simulated results for most values of scatter (<0.6 dex), and SDSS statistics are insufficient to provide firm constraints. However, this method could provide much tighter constraints on stellar mass–halo mass scatter in the future if applied to larger data sets, especially the anticipated Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument Bright Galaxy Survey. Constraining the value of scatter could have important implications for galaxy formation and evolution.


2021 ◽  
Vol 923 (1) ◽  
pp. 68
Author(s):  
P.-A. Oria ◽  
B. Famaey ◽  
G. F. Thomas ◽  
R. Ibata ◽  
J. Freundlich ◽  
...  

Abstract We explore the predictions of Milgromian gravity (MOND) in the local universe by considering the distribution of the “phantom” dark matter (PDM) that would source the MOND gravitational field in Newtonian gravity, allowing an easy comparison with the dark matter framework. For this, we specifically deal with the quasi-linear version of MOND (QUMOND). We compute the “stellar-to-(phantom)halo mass relation” (SHMR), a monotonically increasing power law resembling the SHMR observationally deduced from spiral galaxy rotation curves in the Newtonian context. We show that the gas-to-(phantom)halo mass relation is flat. We generate a map of the Local Volume in QUMOND, highlighting the important influence of distant galaxy clusters, in particular Virgo. This allows us to explore the scatter of the SHMR and the average density of PDM around galaxies in the Local Volume, ΩPDM ≈ 0.1, below the average cold dark matter density in a ΛCDM universe. We provide a model of the Milky Way in its external field in the MOND context, which we compare to an observational estimate of the escape velocity curve. Finally, we highlight the peculiar features related to the external field effect in the form of negative PDM density zones in the outskirts of each galaxy, and test a new analytic formula for computing galaxy rotation curves in the presence of an external field in QUMOND. While we show that the negative PDM density zones would be difficult to detect dynamically, we quantify the weak-lensing signal they could produce for lenses at z ∼ 0.3.


Author(s):  
Stuart Marongwe

We report the use of Einstein rings to reveal the quantized and dynamical states of space-time in a region of impressed gravitational field as predicted by the Nexus Paradigm of quantum gravity. This in turn reveals the orbital speeds of objects found therein and the radius of curvature of the quantized space-time. Similarities between the Nexus graviton and the singular isothermal sphere (SIS) in the Cold Dark Matter (CDM) paradigm are highlighted. However unlike the singular isothermal sphere, the Nexus graviton does not contain singularities or divergent integrals. This solves the core cusp problem. In this work, data from a sample of fifteen Einstein rings published on the Cfa-Arizona Space Telescope Lens Survey (CASTLES) website is used to probe the quantized properties of space-time.


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