High-Resolution Spectroscopic Studies of the Intergalactic Medium

Mathematics – Logic

Scientific paper

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Scientific paper

Theoretical studies of cosmological structure formation predict that a large fraction of primordial baryons have not accreted onto galaxies. Instead, they are distributed between the galaxies in a complex intergalactic medium (IGM) structured in filaments and voids. Ranging in temperature from 10,000 K to several million degrees, this gas has a distribution of ions determined by collisional ionization and photoionization by EUV and X-ray backgrounds. Ultraviolet spectral surveys (Hubble, FUSE) have detected the hot IGM in resonant absorption lines of trace species (H I, O VI, N V, Ne VIII). However, a significant fraction (40-50 percent) of the baryons has eluded detection. They may reside in million-degree gas produced by cosmological shocks, galactic winds, and virialized circumgalactic gas. Searching for this hot, metal-contaminated gas will require high-throughput X-ray spectrographs, to detect narrow (50-100 km/s) absorption lines from the key ions (C V, N VI, O VII, O VIII, Ne IX) that dominate million-degree plasmas. Such X-ray missions need spectral resolution exceeding 100 km/s and a combination of effective area and exposure time to reliably detect these spectral features.

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