Conveners
Early growth of structure with warm wave dark matter
- Simon May
- (Chair: Luna Zagorac)
Description
I will present unique features in the growth of structure in wave dark
matter models with warm white noise, where the power spectrum is peaked
at sub-horizon wavenumbers, using results from numerical simulations.
The post-inflationary production of bosonic particles, such as axions or
axion-like particles, leads to an enhanced isocurvature density power
spectrum on small scales. Moreover, when dark matter is extremely light,
these inhomogeneities result in a non-negligible velocity dispersion and
hence free-streaming suppression of the adiabatic power spectrum.
Starting with the Schrödinger–Poisson system of equations as the
relevant equations of motion, I will present results from simulations of
cosmic structure formation and compare them to analytic predictions. In
particular, the simulations reveal the enhancement and evolution of the
small-scale power spectrum and the formation of non-linear collapsed
objects, including wave dark matter halos and “Bose stars” (solitons),
shortly after matter–radiation equality. Using hydrodynamical
simulations of warm wave dark matter with baryons, I will further show
first insights into how this affects the early clustering of baryonic
matter. Probes of the small-scale power spectrum (e.g. dynamical heating
of stars, Ly-α forest, gravitational lensing, 21cm line intensity
mapping) can be sensitive to these effects of warm white noise on
quasi-linear scales, making this broad class of dark matter models
accessible to observations.
