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Insights into Reionization From the Large-Scale Statistics of Lyman-α Emission and Absorption
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Insights into Reionization From the Large-Scale Statistics of Lyman-α Emission and Absorption
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Dissertation
Insights into Reionization From the Large-Scale Statistics of Lyman-α Emission and Absorption
2025
Overview
The Epoch of Reionization is the cosmological time period during which the gas in the inter-galactic medium (IGM) underwent its last major transition from cold and neutral to hot and highly ionized, driven by the first sources of hydrogen-ionizing photons. Over the past decade, cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurements, in combination with observations of the Lyman-α (Lyα) forest of high-redshift quasars, indicate that the bulk of reionization occurred between z ≈ 5 − 12. Relatively little is known about the sources that drove this process. In this dissertation, I use cosmological simulations to explore how observations of Lyα emissions from high-redshift galaxies, as well as Lyα forest absorption, can be used to probe the nature of reionization and its sources. In Project 1, I explore large-scale statistics of Lyα emitters (LAEs) as a probe of reionization. Curiously, SILVERRUSH, a recent LAE survey using Hyper Suprime-Cam on the Subaru telescope, displays large-scale (∼ 200 comoving Mpc) intra-field fluctuations in the observed surface densities of LAEs. The fluctuations are particularly prominent at redshift z = 5.7, an epoch when state-of-the-art models of reionization suggest that there might have been large patches of neutral gas in cosmological voids. I explore the nature of these fluctuations, as well as the capabilities of different LAE spatial-clustering statistics, such as the two-point correlation function, void probability function, and peak overdensity function, to detect the presence of reionization’s tail end in the observed spatial distribution of LAEs. In Project 2, I explore the correlation between LAE large-scale structure and the local Lyα forest opacity as measured along nearby quasar sightlines – termed the opacity-density relation. Recent observations suggest that both highly-opaque and highly-transmissive Lyα forest sight lines are associated with local under-densities in the galaxy distribution. The association of transmissive sight lines with under-densities is difficult to reconcile with some existing models of intergalactic fluctuations. I test the consistency of these results with new radiative transfer simulations of reionization, which provide detailed modeling of the intergalactic radiation, temperature, and ionization fluctuations. I also use these simulations to explore what the opacity-density relation can (and cannot) tell us about the reionization process and its sources.
Publisher
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
Subject
ISBN
9798314814246
