Outputs (16)

Swift: A modern highly-parallel gravity and smoothed particle hydrodynamics solver for astrophysical and cosmological applications (2024)
Journal Article
Schaller, M., Borrow, J., Draper, P. W., Ivkovic, M., McAlpine, S., Vandenbroucke, B., …Xiang, Z. (2024). Swift: A modern highly-parallel gravity and smoothed particle hydrodynamics solver for astrophysical and cosmological applications. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stae922

Numerical simulations have become one of the key tools used by theorists in all the fields of astrophysics and cosmology. The development of modern tools that target the largest existing computing systems and exploit state-of-the-art numerical method... Read More about Swift: A modern highly-parallel gravity and smoothed particle hydrodynamics solver for astrophysical and cosmological applications.

The impact and response of mini-haloes and the interhalo medium on cosmic reionization (2024)
Journal Article
Chan, T. K., Benítez-Llambay, A., Theuns, T., Frenk, C., & Bower, R. (2024). The impact and response of mini-haloes and the interhalo medium on cosmic reionization. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 528(2), 1296-1326. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stae114

An ionization front (I-front) that propagates through an inhomogeneous medium is slowed down by self-shielding and recombination's. We perform cosmological radiation hydrodynamics simulations of the I-front propagation during the epoch of cosmic reio... Read More about The impact and response of mini-haloes and the interhalo medium on cosmic reionization.

A halo model for cosmological Lyman-limit systems (2023)
Journal Article
Theuns, T., & Keung Chan, T. (2024). A halo model for cosmological Lyman-limit systems. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 527(1), 689–705. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stad3176

We present an analytical model for cosmological Lyman-limit systems (LLS) that successfully reproduces the observed evolution of the mean free path (λeff) of ionizing photons. The evolution of the co-moving mean free path is predominantly a consequen... Read More about A halo model for cosmological Lyman-limit systems.

Simulations of the reionization of the clumpy intergalactic medium with a novel particle-based two-moment radiative transfer scheme (2023)
Journal Article

The progress of cosmic reionization depends on the presence of over-dense regions that act as photon sinks. Such sinks may slow down ionization fronts as compared to a uniform intergalactic medium (IGM) by increasing the clumping factor. We present s... Read More about Simulations of the reionization of the clumpy intergalactic medium with a novel particle-based two-moment radiative transfer scheme.

The impact of cosmic rays on dynamical balance and disc–halo interaction in L⋆ disc galaxies (2022)
Journal Article

Cosmic rays (CRs) are an important component in the interstellar medium, but their effect on the dynamics of the disc–halo interface (5 × 105 K) gas scale height is suppressed; (3) the warm-hot (2 × 104–5 × 105 K) medium becomes the most volume-filli... Read More about The impact of cosmic rays on dynamical balance and disc–halo interaction in L⋆ disc galaxies.

Hot-mode accretion and the physics of thin-disc galaxy formation (2022)
Journal Article

We use FIRE simulations to study disc formation in z ∼ 0, Milky Way-mass galaxies, and conclude that a key ingredient for the formation of thin stellar discs is the ability for accreting gas to develop an aligned angular momentum distribution via int... Read More about Hot-mode accretion and the physics of thin-disc galaxy formation.

The In Situ Origins of Dwarf Stellar Outskirts in FIRE-2 (2022)
Journal Article

Extended, old, and round stellar halos appear to be ubiquitous around high-mass dwarf galaxies (108.5 < M⋆/M⊙ < 109.6) in the observed universe. However, it is unlikely that these dwarfs have undergone a sufficient number of minor mergers to form ste... Read More about The In Situ Origins of Dwarf Stellar Outskirts in FIRE-2.

Gas infall and radial transport in cosmological simulations of milky way-mass discs (2021)
Journal Article

Observations indicate that a continuous supply of gas is needed to maintain observed star formation rates in large, discy galaxies. To fuel star formation, gas must reach the inner regions of such galaxies. Despite its crucial importance for galaxy e... Read More about Gas infall and radial transport in cosmological simulations of milky way-mass discs.

Which AGN jets quench star formation in massive galaxies? (2021)
Journal Article

Without additional heating, radiative cooling of the halo gas of massive galaxies (Milky Way-mass and above) produces cold gas or stars exceeding that observed. Heating from active galactic nucleus (AGN) jets is likely required, but the jet propertie... Read More about Which AGN jets quench star formation in massive galaxies?.

Smoothed particle radiation hydrodynamics: two-moment method with local Eddington tensor closure (2021)
Journal Article

We present a new smoothed particle hydrodynamics-radiative transfer method (SPH-M1RT) that is coupled dynamically with SPH. We implement it in the (task-based parallel) SWIFT galaxy simulation code but it can be straightforwardly implemented in other... Read More about Smoothed particle radiation hydrodynamics: two-moment method with local Eddington tensor closure.

Virial shocks are suppressed in cosmic ray-dominated galaxy haloes (2021)
Journal Article

We study the impact of cosmic rays (CRs) on the structure of virial shocks, using a large suite of high-resolution cosmological FIRE-2 simulations accounting for CR injection by supernovae. In Milky Way-mass, low-redshift (z ≲ 1−2) haloes, which are... Read More about Virial shocks are suppressed in cosmic ray-dominated galaxy haloes.

Virialization of the Inner CGM in the FIRE Simulations and Implications for Galaxy Disks, Star Formation, and Feedback (2021)
Journal Article

We use the FIRE-2 cosmological simulations to study the formation of a quasi-static, virial-temperature gas phase in the circumgalactic medium (CGM) at redshifts 0 < z < 5 and how the formation of this virialized phase affects the evolution of galact... Read More about Virialization of the Inner CGM in the FIRE Simulations and Implications for Galaxy Disks, Star Formation, and Feedback.

Testing physical models for cosmic ray transport coefficients on galactic scales: self-confinement and extrinsic turbulence at ∼GeV energies (2020)
Journal Article

The microphysics of ∼ GeV cosmic ray (CR) transport on galactic scales remain deeply uncertain, with almost all studies adopting simple prescriptions (e.g. constant diffusivity). We explore different physically motivated, anisotropic, dynamical CR tr... Read More about Testing physical models for cosmic ray transport coefficients on galactic scales: self-confinement and extrinsic turbulence at ∼GeV energies.

Cosmic-Ray Driven Outflows to Mpc Scales from L* Galaxies (2020)
Journal Article

We study the effects of cosmic rays (CRs) on outflows from star-forming galaxies in the circum and intergalactic medium (CGM/IGM), in high-resolution, fully cosmological FIRE-2 simulations (accounting for mechanical and radiative stellar feedback, ma... Read More about Cosmic-Ray Driven Outflows to Mpc Scales from L* Galaxies.

A dark matter profile to model diverse feedback-induced core sizes of ΛCDM haloes (2020)
Journal Article

We analyse the cold dark matter density profiles of 54 galaxy haloes simulated with Feedback In Realistic Environments (FIRE)-2 galaxy formation physics, each resolved within 0.5 per cent of the halo virial radius. These haloes contain galaxies with... Read More about A dark matter profile to model diverse feedback-induced core sizes of ΛCDM haloes.

The fates of the circumgalactic medium in the FIRE simulations (2020)
Journal Article

We analyse the different fates of the circumgalactic medium (CGM) in FIRE-2 cosmological simulations, focusing on the redshifts z = 0.25 and 2 representative of recent surveys. Our analysis includes 21 zoom-in simulations covering the halo mass range... Read More about The fates of the circumgalactic medium in the FIRE simulations.