Related papers: X-rays and hard UV radiation From the First Galaxi…
By heating the intergalactic medium (IGM) before reionization, X-rays are expected to play a prominent role in the early Universe. The cosmic 21-cm signal from this "Epoch of Heating" (EoH) could serve as a clean probe of high-energy…
Observational studies indicate that the intergalactic medium (IGM) is highly ionized up to redshifts just over 6. A number of models have been developed to describe the process of reionization and the effects of the ionizing photons from…
Upcoming observations of the 21-cm signal from the Epoch of Reionization will soon provide the first direct detection of this era. This signal is influenced by many astrophysical effects, including long range X-ray heating of the…
Observations of the Ly-alpha forest at z~3 reveal an average metallicity Z~0.01 Z_solar. The high-redshift supernovae that polluted the IGM also accelerated relativistic electrons. Since the energy density of the CMB scales as (1+z)^4, at…
The cosmological 21cm signal is a physics-rich probe of the early Universe, encoding information about both the ionization and the thermal history of the intergalactic medium (IGM). The latter is likely governed by X-rays from…
We present simulations of the 21-cm signal during the epoch of reionization. We focus on properly modeling the absorption regime in the presence of inhomogeneous Wouthuysen-Field effect and X-ray heating. We ran radiative transfer…
X-rays emitted by high mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) and supernovae-driven winds in the first galaxies during Cosmic Dawn are expected to warm the intergalactic medium prior to its reionization. While most of the heating will be uniform on…
The hardness of the ionizing continuum from the first sources of UV radiation plays a crucial role in the reionization of the intergalactic medium (IGM). While usual stellar populations have soft spectra, mini-quasars or metal-free stars…
The 21-cm signal from the cosmic reionization epoch can shed light on the history of heating of the primordial intergalactic medium (IGM) at z~30-10. It has been suggested that X-rays from the first accreting black holes could significantly…
We investigate the 21-cm signature that may arise from the intergalactic medium (IGM) prior to the epoch of full reionization (z>5). In scenarios in which the IGM is reionized by discrete sources of photoionizing radiation, the neutral gas…
Heating of neutral gas by energetic sources is crucial for the prediction of the 21 cm signal during the epoch of reionization (EoR). To investigate differences induced on statistics of the 21 cm signal by various source types, we use five…
Observations of the 21 cm line from neutral hydrogen indicate that an Epoch of Heating (EoH) might have preceded the later Epoch of Reionization (EoR). Here we study the effects on the ionization state and the thermal history of the…
Due to their long mean free path, X-rays are expected to have an important impact on cosmic reionization by heating and ionizing the IGM on large scales, especially after simulations have suggested that Population III stars may form in…
We examine the constraints on soft X-ray emissions from the reionization era. It has generally been assumed that the Universe was reionized by ultraviolet photons from massive stars. However, it has been argued that X-ray photons associated…
Observations of the redshifted 21 cm line with upcoming radio telescopes promise to transform our understanding of the cosmic reionization. To unravel the underlying physical process, we investigate the 21 cm structures of three different…
We use cosmological simulations to study the X-ray ionisation and heating of the intergalactic medium by an early population of accreting black holes. By considering observational constraints from the X-ray background, we find an upper…
Models and simulations of the epoch of reionization predict that spectra of the 21-cm transition of atomic hydrogen will show a clear fluctuation peak, at a redshift and scale, respectively, that mark the central stage of reionization and…
Using a reliably measured intrinsic (i.e. corrected for absorption effects) present-day luminosity function of high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) in the 0.25-2 keV energy band per unit star-formation rate, we estimate the preheating of the…
[abridged] With their long mean free paths and efficient heating of the intergalactic medium (IGM), X-rays could have a dramatic impact on the thermal and ionization history of the Universe. We explore this in various signals: (i)…
The emission of 21-cm radiation from a neutral intergalactic medium (IGM) at high redshift is discussed in connection with the thermal and ionization history of the universe. The physical mechanisms that make such radiation detectable…