| 1. |
- Giri, Sambit K., 1993-
(författare)
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Tomographic studies of the 21-cm signal during reionization : Going beyond the power spectrum
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The formation of the first luminous sources in the Universe, such as the first generation of stars and accreting black holes, led to the ionization of hydrogen gas present in the intergalactic medium (IGM). This period in which the Universe transitioned from a cold and neutral state to a predominantly hot and ionized state is known as the Epoch of Reionization (EoR). The EoR is one of the least understood epochs in the Universe's evolution mostly due to the lack of direct observations. We can probe the reionization process with the 21-cm signal, produced by the spin-flip transition in neutral hydrogen. However, current radio telescopes have not been able to detect this faint signal. The low-frequency component of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA-Low), will be sensitive enough not only to detect the 21-cm signal produced during EoR but also to produce images of its distribution on the sky. A sequence of such 21-cm images from different redshifts will constitute a three-dimensional, tomographic, data set. Before the SKA comes online, it is prudent to develop methods to analyse these tomographic images in a statistical sense. In this thesis, we study the prospect of understanding the EoR using such tomographic analysis methods. In Paper I, II and V, we use simulated 21-cm data sets to investigate methods to extract and interpret information from those images. We implement a new image segmentation technique, known as superpixels, to identify ionized regions in the images and find that it performs better than previously proposed methods. Once we have identified the ionized regions (also known as bubbles), we can determine the bubble size distribution (BSD) using various size finding algorithms and use the BSDs as a summary statistics of the 21-cm signal during reionization. We also investigate the impact of different line of sight effects, such as light-cone effect and redshift space distortions on the measured BSDs. During the late stages of reionization, the BSDs become less informative since most of the IGM has become ionized. We therefore propose to study the neutral regions (also known as islands) during these late times. In Paper V, we find that most neutral islands will be relatively easy to detect with SKA-Low as they remain quite large until the end of reionization and their size distribution depends on the properties of the sources of reionization. Previous studies have shown that the 21-cm signal is highly non-Gaussian. Therefore the power spectrum cannot characterize the signal completely. In Paper III and IV, we use the bispectrum, a higher-order statistics related to the three-point correlation function, to characterize the signal. In Paper III, we probe the non-Gaussianity in the 21-cm signal caused by temperature fluctuations due to the presence of X-Ray sources. We find that the evolution of the normalized bispectrum is different from that of the power spectrum, which is useful for breaking the degeneracy between models which use different types of X-Ray sources. We also show that the 21-cm bispectrum can be constructed from observations with SKA-Low. Paper IV presents a fast and simple method to study the so-called squeezed limit version of the bispectrum, which describes how the small-scale fluctuations respond to the large-scale environment. We show that this quantity evolves during reionization and differs between different reionization scenarios.
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| 2. |
- Iliev, Ilian T., et al.
(författare)
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Cosmological radiative transfer comparison project - II. The radiation-hydrodynamic tests
- 2009
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Ingår i: Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0035-8711 .- 1365-2966. ; , s. 1313-
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The development of radiation hydrodynamical methods that are able to follow gas dynamics and radiative transfer (RT) self-consistently is key to the solution of many problems in numerical astrophysics. Such fluid flows are highly complex, rarely allowing even for approximate analytical solutions against which numerical codes can be tested. An alternative validation procedure is to compare different methods against each other on common problems, in order to assess the robustness of the results and establish a range of validity for the methods. Previously, we presented such a comparison for a set of pure RT tests (i.e. for fixed, non-evolving density fields). This is the second paper of the Cosmological Radiative Transfer Comparison Project, in which we compare nine independent RT codes directly coupled to gas dynamics on three relatively simple astrophysical hydrodynamics problems: (i) the expansion of an HII region in a uniform medium, (ii) an ionization front in a 1/r2 density profile with a flat core and (iii) the photoevaporation of a uniform dense clump. Results show a broad agreement between the different methods and no big failures, indicating that the participating codes have reached a certain level of maturity and reliability. However, many details still do differ, and virtually every code has showed some shortcomings and has disagreed, in one respect or another, with the majority of the results. This underscores the fact that no method is universal and all require careful testing of the particular features which are most relevant to the specific problem at hand.
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| 3. |
- Koopmans, Léon V. E., et al.
(författare)
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Peering into the dark (ages) with low-frequency space interferometers : Using the 21-cm signal of neutral hydrogen from the infant universe to probe fundamental (Astro)physics
- 2021
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Ingår i: Experimental astronomy. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0922-6435 .- 1572-9508. ; 51, s. 1641-1676
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Dark Ages and Cosmic Dawn are largely unexplored windows on the infant Universe (z ~ 200–10). Observations of the redshifted 21-cm line of neutral hydrogen can provide valuable new insight into fundamental physics and astrophysics during these eras that no other probe can provide, and drives the design of many future ground-based instruments such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) and the Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array (HERA). We review progress in the field of high-redshift 21-cm Cosmology, in particular focussing on what questions can be addressed by probing the Dark Ages at z > 30. We conclude that only a space- or lunar-based radio telescope, shielded from the Earth’s radio-frequency interference (RFI) signals and its ionosphere, enable the 21-cm signal from the Dark Ages to be detected. We suggest a generic mission design concept, CoDEX, that will enable this in the coming decades.
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| 4. |
- Mellema, Garrelt, et al.
(författare)
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Reionization and the Cosmic Dawn with the Square Kilometre Array
- 2013
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Ingår i: Experimental astronomy. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0922-6435 .- 1572-9508. ; 36:1-2, s. 235-318
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will have a low frequency component (SKA-low) which has as one of its main science goals the study of the redshifted 21 cm line from the earliest phases of star and galaxy formation in the Universe. This 21 cm signal provides a new and unique window both on the time of the formation of the first stars and accreting black holes and the subsequent period of substantial ionization of the intergalactic medium. The signal will teach us fundamental new things about the earliest phases of structure formation, cosmology and even has the potential to lead to the discovery of new physical phenomena. Here we present a white paper with an overview of the science questions that SKA-low can address, how we plan to tackle these questions and what this implies for the basic design of the telescope.
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| 5. |
- Shaw, Abinash Kumar, et al.
(författare)
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Studying the multifrequency angular power spectrum of the cosmic dawn 21-cm signal
- 2023
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Ingår i: Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. - 0035-8711 .- 1365-2966. ; 522:2, s. 2188-2206
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The light-cone (LC) anisotropy arises due to cosmic evolution of the cosmic dawn (CD) 21-cm signal along the line-of-sight (LoS) axis of the observation volume. The LC effect makes the signal statistically non-ergodic along the LoS axis. The multifrequency angular power spectrum (MAPS) provides an unbiased alternative to the popular three-dimensional (3D) power spectrum as it does not assume statistical ergodicity along every direction in the signal volume. Unlike the 3D power spectrum which mixes the cosmic evolution of the 21-cm signal along the LoS k modes, MAPS keeps the evolution information disentangled. Here, we first study the impact of different underlying physical processes during CD on the behaviour of the 21-cm MAPS using simulations of various different scenarios and models. We also make error predictions in 21-cm MAPS measurements considering only the system noise and cosmic variance for mock observations of Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array (HERA), NenuFAR, and SKA-Low. We find that 100 h of HERA observations will be able to measure 21-cm MAPS at >= 3 sigma for <= 1000 with 0. 1 MHz channel-width. The better sensitivity of SKA-Low allows reaching this sensitivity up to <= 3000. Note that due to the difference in the frequency coverage of the various experiments, the CD-epoch of reionization model considered for NenuFAR is different than those used for the HERA and SKA-Low predictions. Considering NenuFAR with the new model, measurements >= 2 sigma are possible only for <= 600 with 0. 2 MHz channel-width and for a 10 times longer observation time of t (obs) = 1000 h. However, for the range 300 <= <= 600 and t obs = 1000 h more than 3smeasurements are still possible for NenuFAR when combining consecutive frequency channels within a 5 MHz band.
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