Complete Zeldovich approximation

We have developed a generalization of the Zeldovich approximation (ZA) that is exact in a wide variety of situations, including plannar, spherical and cilyndrical symmetries. We have shown that this generalization, that we call complete Zeldovich approximation (CZA), is exact to second order at an arbitrary point within any field. For gaussian fields, the third order error have been obtained and shown to be very small. For statistical purposes, the CZA leads to results exact to the third order.Comment: 11 pages+1 figure, accepted in ApJ Letter

Fluctuations of K-band galaxy counts

We measure the variance in the distribution of off-plane (|b|>20 deg.) galaxies with m_K<13.5 from the 2MASS K-band survey in circles of diameter between 0.344 deg. and 57.2 deg. The use of a near-infrared survey makes negligible the contribution of Galactic extinction to these fluctuations. We calculate these variances within the standard Lambda-CDM model assuming that the sources are distributed like halos of the corresponding mass, and it reproduces qualitatively the galaxy counts variance. Therefore, we test that the counts can be basically explained in terms only of the large scale structure. A second result of this paper is a new method to determine the two point correlation function obtained by forcing agreement between model and data. This method does not need the knowledge of the two-point angular correlation function, allows an estimation of the errors (which are low with this method), and can be used even with incomplete surveys. Using this method we get xi(z=0, r<10 h^{-1}Mpc)=(29.8+/-0.3) (r/h^{-1}Mpc)^{-1.79+/-0.02}, which is the first measure of the amplitude of xi in the local Universe for the K-band. It is more or less in agreement with those obtained through red optical filters selected samples, but it is larger than the amplitude obtained for blue optical filters selected samples.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, accepted to be published in A&

Generation of galactic disc warps due to intergalactic accretion flows onto the disc

A new method is developed to calculate the amplitude of the galactic warps generated by a torque due to external forces. This takes into account that the warp is produced as a reorientation of the different rings which constitute the disc in order to compensate the differential precession generated by the external force, yielding a uniform asymptotic precession for all rings. Application of this method to gravitational tidal forces in the Milky Way due to the Magellanic Clouds leads to a very low amplitude of the warp. If the force were due to an extragalactic magnetic field, its intensity would have to be very high, to generate the observed warps. An alternative hypothesis is explored: the accretion of the intergalactic medium over the disk. A cup-shaped distortion is expected, due to the transmission of the linear momentum; but, this effect is small and the predominant effect turns out to be the transmission of angular momentum, i.e. a torque giving an integral-sign shape warp. The torque produced by a flow of velocity ~100 km/s and baryon density \~10^{-25} kg/m^3 is enough to generate the observed warps and this mechanism offers quite a plausible explanation. First, because this order of accretion rate is inferred from other processes observed in the Galaxy, notably its chemical evolution. The inferred rate of infall of matter, ~1 solar-mass/yr, to the Galactic disc that this theory predicts agrees with the quantitative predictions of this chemical evolution resolving key issues, notably the G-dwarf problem. Second, because the required density of the intergalactic medium is within the range of values compatible with observation. By this mechanism, we can explain the warp phenomenon in terms of intergalactic accretion flows onto the disk of the galaxy.Comment: 18 pages, 11 figures, accepted to be published in A&

Probability distribution of density fluctuations in the non-linear regime

We present a general procedure for obtaining the present density fluctuation probability distribution given the statistics of the initial conditions. The main difficulties faced with regard to this problem are those related to the non-linear evolution of the density fluctuations and those posed by the fact that the fields we are interested in are the result of filtering an underlying field with structure down to scales much smaller than that of filtering. The solution to the latter problem is discussed here in detail and the solution to the former is taken from a previous work. We have checked the procedure for values of the rms density fluctuation as large as 3/2 and several power spectra and found that it leads to results in excellent agreement with those obtained in numerical simulations. We also recover all available exact results from perturbation theory.Comment: Accepted to be published in Ap

The spherical collapse model with shell crossing

In this work, we study the formation and evolution of dark matter halos by means of the spherical infall model with shell-crossing. We present a framework to tackle this effect properly based on the numerical follow-up, with time, of that individual shell of matter that contains always the same fraction of mass with respect to the total mass. In this first step, we do not include angular momentum, velocity dispersion or triaxiality. Within this framework - named as the Spherical Shell Tracker (SST) - we investigate the dependence of the evolution of the halo with virial mass, with the adopted mass fraction of the shell, and for different cosmologies. We find that our results are very sensitive to a variation of the halo virial mass or the mass fraction of the shell that we consider. However, we obtain a negligible dependence on cosmology. Furthermore, we show that the effect of shell-crossing plays a crucial role in the way that the halo reaches the stabilization in radius and the virial equilibrium. We find that the values currently adopted in the literature for the actual density contrast at the moment of virialization, delta_vir, may not be accurate enough. In this context, we stress the problems related to the definition of a virial mass and a virial radius for the halo. The question of whether the results found here may be obtained by tracking the shells with an analytic approximation remains to be explored.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, 9 tables, replaced to match the published MNRAS versio

Azimuthal dependence of the density distribution in outer galactic discs accreting intergalactic flows

AIMS. The amplitude and scaleheight of the Galactic gas disc density are not axisymmetric against expectations in a self-gravity axisymmetric disc. However, this lopsidedness can be explained in terms of intergalactic accretion flows, which produce non-axisymmetric pressure on the disc. This mechanism could be also responsible for the formation of a warp. METHODS. We analytically derive the relationship between the disc density and the self-gravity and external pressure. RESULTS. The same scenario of accretion as we proposed years ago to explain the formation of the warp explains the azimuthal dependence of the density and its scaleheight, with minimum/maximum in the positions of maximum amplitude of the warp (phi=95 deg. and 275 deg.), as expected from its pressure distribution.Comment: 4 pages, accepted to be published in A&A-letter

Virial theorem in clusters of galaxies with MOND

A specific modification of Newtonian dynamics known as MOND has been shown to reproduce the dynamics of most astrophysical systems at different scales without invoking non-baryonic dark matter (DM). There is, however, a long-standing unsolved problem when MOND is applied to rich clusters of galaxies in the form of a deficit (by a factor around two) of predicted dynamical mass derived from the virial theorem with respect to observations. In this article we approach the virial theorem using the velocity dispersion of cluster members along the line of sight rather than using the cluster temperature from X-ray data and hydrostatic equilibrium. Analytical calculations of the virial theorem in clusters for Newtonian gravity+DM and MOND are developed, applying pressure (surface) corrections for non-closed systems. Recent calibrations of DM profiles, baryonic ratio and baryonic ($\beta$ model or others) profiles are used, while allowing free parameters to range within the observational constraints. It is shown that solutions exist for MOND in clusters that give similar results to Newton+DM -- particularly in the case of an isothermal $\beta$ model for $\beta =0.55-0.70$ and core radii $r_c$ between 0.1 and 0.3 times $r_{500}$ (in agreement with the known data). The disagreements found in previous studies seem to be due to the lack of pressure corrections (based on inappropriate hydrostatic equilibrium assumptions) and/or inappropriate parameters for the baryonic matter profiles.Comment: accepted to be published in MNRA

Cosmic Voids and Galaxy Bias in the Halo Occupation Framework

(Abridged) We investigate the power of void statistics to constrain galaxy bias and the amplitude of dark matter fluctuations. We use the halo occupation distribution (HOD) framework to describe the relation between galaxies and dark matter. After choosing HOD parameters that reproduce the mean space density n_gal and projected correlation function w_p measured for galaxy samples with M_r<-19 and M_r<-21 from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), we predict the void probability function (VPF) and underdensity probability function (UPF) of these samples by populating the halos of a large, high-resolution N-body simulation. If we make the conventional assumption that the HOD is independent of large scale environment at fixed halo mass, then models constrained to match n_gal and w_p predict nearly identical void statistics, independent of the scatter between halo mass and central galaxy luminosity or uncertainties in HOD parameters. Models with sigma_8=0.7 and sigma_8=0.9 also predict very similar void statistics. However, the VPF and UPF are sensitive to environmental variations of the HOD in a regime where these variations have little impact on w_p. For example, doubling the minimum host halo mass in regions with large scale (5 Mpc/h) density contrast delta<-0.65 has a readily detectable impact on void probabilities of M_r<-19 galaxies, and a similar change for delta<-0.2 alters the void probabilities of M_r<-21 galaxies at a detectable level. The VPF and UPF provide complementary information about the onset and magnitude of density- dependence in the HOD. By detecting or ruling out HOD changes in low density regions, void statistics can reduce systematic uncertainties in the cosmological constraints derived from HOD modeling, and, more importantly, reveal connections between halo formation history and galaxy properties.Comment: emulateapj, 16 pages, 13 figure