scholarly journals Voronoi volume function: a new probe of cosmology and galaxy evolution

2020 ◽  
Vol 495 (3) ◽  
pp. 3233-3251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aseem Paranjape ◽  
Shadab Alam

ABSTRACT We study the Voronoi volume function (VVF) – the distribution of cell volumes (or inverse local number density) in the Voronoi tessellation of any set of cosmological tracers (galaxies/haloes). We show that the shape of the VVF of biased tracers responds sensitively to physical properties such as halo mass, large-scale environment, substructure, and redshift-space effects, making this a hitherto unexplored probe of both primordial cosmology and galaxy evolution. Using convenient summary statistics – the width, median, and a low percentile of the VVF as functions of average tracer number density – we explore these effects for tracer populations in a suite of N-body simulations of a range of dark matter models. Our summary statistics sensitively probe primordial features such as small-scale oscillations in the initial matter power spectrum (as arise in models involving collisional effects in the dark sector), while being largely insensitive to a truncation of initial power (as in warm dark matter models). For vanilla cold dark matter (CDM) cosmologies, the summary statistics display strong evolution and redshift-space effects, and are also sensitive to cosmological parameter values for realistic tracer samples. Comparing the VVF of galaxies in the Galaxies & Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey with that of abundance-matched CDM (sub)haloes tentatively reveals environmental effects in GAMA beyond halo mass (modulo unmodelled satellite properties). Our exploratory analysis thus paves the way for using the VVF as a new probe of galaxy evolution physics as well as the nature of dark matter and dark energy.

2004 ◽  
Vol 220 ◽  
pp. 467-476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel R. Primack

Cold Dark Matter with a large cosmological constant (ACDM) appears to fit large scale structure observations well. of the possible small scale problems, the Central Cusps and Too Many Satellites problems now appear to be at least partly solved, so Angular Momentum has become the most serious remaining CDM problem. There are actually at least two different angular momentum problems: A. Too much transfer of angular momentum to the dark halo to make big disks, and B. Wrong distribution of specific angular momentum to make spiral galaxies, if the baryonic material has the same angular momentum distribution as the dark matter. the angular momentum of dark matter halos, and presumably that of the galaxies they host, appears to arise largely from the orbital angular momentum of the satellites that they accrete. Since the dark and baryonic matter behave very differently in such accretion events, it is possible that the resulting angular momentum distribution of the baryons is different from that of the dark matter, as required to make the sort of galactic disks that are observed. the latest hydrodynamical simulations give some grounds for hope on this score, but much higher resolution simulations are needed.


2020 ◽  
Vol 501 (1) ◽  
pp. L71-L75
Author(s):  
Cornelius Rampf ◽  
Oliver Hahn

ABSTRACT Perturbation theory is an indispensable tool for studying the cosmic large-scale structure, and establishing its limits is therefore of utmost importance. One crucial limitation of perturbation theory is shell-crossing, which is the instance when cold-dark-matter trajectories intersect for the first time. We investigate Lagrangian perturbation theory (LPT) at very high orders in the vicinity of the first shell-crossing for random initial data in a realistic three-dimensional Universe. For this, we have numerically implemented the all-order recursion relations for the matter trajectories, from which the convergence of the LPT series at shell-crossing is established. Convergence studies performed at large orders reveal the nature of the convergence-limiting singularities. These singularities are not the well-known density singularities at shell-crossing but occur at later times when LPT already ceased to provide physically meaningful results.


2021 ◽  
Vol 503 (4) ◽  
pp. 5638-5645
Author(s):  
Gábor Rácz ◽  
István Szapudi ◽  
István Csabai ◽  
László Dobos

ABSTRACT The classical gravitational force on a torus is anisotropic and always lower than Newton’s 1/r2 law. We demonstrate the effects of periodicity in dark matter only N-body simulations of spherical collapse and standard Lambda cold dark matter (ΛCDM) initial conditions. Periodic boundary conditions cause an overall negative and anisotropic bias in cosmological simulations of cosmic structure formation. The lower amplitude of power spectra of small periodic simulations is a consequence of the missing large-scale modes and the equally important smaller periodic forces. The effect is most significant when the largest mildly non-linear scales are comparable to the linear size of the simulation box, as often is the case for high-resolution hydrodynamical simulations. Spherical collapse morphs into a shape similar to an octahedron. The anisotropic growth distorts the large-scale ΛCDM dark matter structures. We introduce the direction-dependent power spectrum invariant under the octahedral group of the simulation volume and show that the results break spherical symmetry.


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.


2020 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 283
Author(s):  
T. S. Kosmas ◽  
M. Kortelainen ◽  
J. Suhonen ◽  
J. Toivanen

The scattering of the cold dark matter (CDM) candidate LSP (Lightest Supersymmetric Particle) off nuclei is investigated. We focus on the nuclear-structure aspects of the LSP-nucleus scattering problem and computed the associated event rates as well as the annual modulation signals for the 23Na, 71Ga, 73Ge and 127I CDM detectors by using the nuclear shell model in realistic model spaces and exploiting microscopic effective two-body interactions. Large-scale computations had to be performed in order to achieve convergence of the results. The relevance of the spin-dependent and coherent channels for the event rates is discussed, from both the nuclear structure and the SUSY-model viewpoints.


2019 ◽  
Vol 490 (2) ◽  
pp. 2071-2085 ◽  
Author(s):  
Weiqiang Yang ◽  
Supriya Pan ◽  
Andronikos Paliathanasis ◽  
Subir Ghosh ◽  
Yabo Wu

ABSTRACT Unified cosmological models have received a lot of attention in astrophysics community for explaining both the dark matter and dark energy evolution. The Chaplygin cosmologies, a well-known name in this group have been investigated matched with observations from different sources. Obviously, Chaplygin cosmologies have to obey restrictions in order to be consistent with the observational data. As a consequence, alternative unified models, differing from Chaplygin model, are of special interest. In the present work, we consider a specific example of such a unified cosmological model, that is quantified by only a single parameter μ, that can be considered as a minimal extension of the Λ-cold dark matter cosmology. We investigate its observational boundaries together with an analysis of the universe at large scale. Our study shows that at early time the model behaves like a dust, and as time evolves, it mimics a dark energy fluid depicting a clear transition from the early decelerating phase to the late cosmic accelerating phase. Finally, the model approaches the cosmological constant boundary in an asymptotic manner. We remark that for the present unified model, the estimations of H0 are slightly higher than its local estimation and thus alleviating the H0 tension.


1988 ◽  
Vol 130 ◽  
pp. 259-271
Author(s):  
Carlos S. Frenk

Modern N-body techniques allow the study of galaxy formation in the wider context of the formation of large-scale structure in the Universe. The results of such a study within the cold dark matter cosmogony are described. Dark galactic halos form at relatively recent epochs. Their properties and abundance are similar to those inferred for the halos of real galaxies. Massive halos tend to form preferentially in high density regions and as a result the galaxies that form within them are significantly more clustered than the underlying mass. This natural bias may be strong enough to reconcile the observed clustering of galaxies with the assumption that Ω = 1.


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.


2019 ◽  
Vol 485 (2) ◽  
pp. 2861-2876 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin V Church ◽  
Philip Mocz ◽  
Jeremiah P Ostriker

ABSTRACT Although highly successful on cosmological scales, cold dark matter (CDM) models predict unobserved overdense ‘cusps’ in dwarf galaxies and overestimate their formation rate. We consider an ultralight axion-like scalar boson which promises to reduce these observational discrepancies at galactic scales. The model, known as fuzzy dark matter (FDM), avoids cusps, suppresses small-scale power, and delays galaxy formation via macroscopic quantum pressure. We compare the substructure and density fluctuations of galactic dark matter haloes comprised of ultralight axions to conventional CDM results. Besides self-gravitating subhaloes, FDM includes non-virialized overdense wavelets formed by quantum interference patterns, which are an efficient source of heating to galactic discs. We find that, in the solar neighbourhood, wavelet heating is sufficient to give the oldest disc stars a velocity dispersion of ${\sim } {30}{\, \mathrm{km\, s}^{-1}}$ within a Hubble time if energy is not lost from the disc, the velocity dispersion increasing with stellar age as σD ∝ t0.4 in agreement with observations. Furthermore, we calculate the radius-dependent velocity dispersion and corresponding scaleheight caused by the heating of this dynamical substructure in both CDM and FDM with the determination that these effects will produce a flaring that terminates the Milky Way disc at $15\!-\!20{\, \mathrm{kpc}}$. Although the source of thickened discs is not known, the heating due to perturbations caused by dark substructure cannot exceed the total disc velocity dispersion. Therefore, this work provides a lower bound on the FDM particle mass of ma > 0.6 × 10−22 eV. Furthermore, FDM wavelets with this particle mass should be considered a viable mechanism for producing the observed disc thickening with time.


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