English

Discreteness Effects in Lambda Cold Dark Matter Simulations: A Wavelet-Statistical View

Astrophysics 2009-11-13 v2

Abstract

The effects of particle discreteness in N-body simulations of Lambda Cold Dark Matter (LambdaCDM) are still an intensively debated issue. In this paper we explore such effects, taking into account the scatter caused by the randomness of the initial conditions, and focusing on the statistical properties of the cosmological density field. For this purpose, we run large sets of LambdaCDM simulations and analyse them using a large variety of diagnostics, including new and powerful wavelet statistics. Among other facts, we point out (1) that dynamical evolution does not propagate discreteness noise up from the small scales at which it is introduced, and (2) that one should aim to satisfy the condition epsilon ~ 2d, where "epsilon" is the force resolution and "d" is the interparticle distance. We clarify what such a condition means, and how to implement it in modern cosmological codes.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0804.0294,
  title  = {Discreteness Effects in Lambda Cold Dark Matter Simulations: A Wavelet-Statistical View},
  author = {Alessandro B. Romeo and Oscar Agertz and Ben Moore and Joachim Stadel},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0804.0294},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

ApJ, in press. Minor changes to match the accepted version

R2 v1 2026-06-21T10:26:52.213Z