Velocity dispersion in N-body simulations of CDM models

This work reports on a study of the spatially coarse-grained velocity dispersion in cosmological N-body simulations (OCDM and Lambda-CDM models) as a function of time (redshifts z=0-4) and of the coarsening length (0.6-20 Mpc/h). The main result is the discovery of a polytropic relationship I_1 ~ rho^{2-eta} between the velocity-dispersion kinetic energy density of the coarsening cells, I_1, and their mass density, rho. The exponent eta, dependent on time and coarsening scale, is a compact measure of the deviations from the naive virial prediction eta_virial=0. This relationship supports the ``polytropic assumption'' which has been employed in theoretical models for the growth of cosmological structure by gravitational instability.Comment: Minor, unimportant changes. Matches published versio

Comment on ''On the problem of initial conditions in cosmological N-body simulations'' (Europhys. Lett. 57, 322)

In astro-ph/0109199, the initial conditions (IC's) of cosmological N-body simulations by the Virgo Consortium are analyzed and it is concluded that the density fluctuations are rather different from the desired ones. We have repeated the analysis of the IC's using our own code and the code provided by the authors of astro-ph/0109199, obtaining results that disprove the criticisms.Comment: 2 pages, 4 eps figures, epl.cls style fil

Influence of the cosmological expansion on small systems

The effect of the large-scale cosmological expansion on small systems is studied in the light of modern cosmological models of large-scale structure. We identify certain assumptions of earlier works which render them unrealistic regarding these cosmological models. The question is reanalyzed by dropping these assumptions to conclude that a given small system can experience either an expansion or a contraction of cosmological origin.Comment: 7 pages. Accepted for publication in Europhysics Letter

Dynamics of colloidal particles with capillary interactions

We investigate the dynamics of colloids at a fluid interface driven by attractive capillary interactions. At submillimeter length scales, the capillary attraction is formally analogous to two-dimensional gravity. In particular it is a non-integrable interaction and it can be actually relevant for collective phenomena in spite of its weakness at the level of the pair potential. We introduce a mean-field model for the dynamical evolution of the particle number density at the interface. For generic values of the physical parameters the homogeneous distribution is found to be unstable against large-scale clustering driven by the capillary attraction. We also show that for the instability to be observable, the appropriate values for the relevant parameters (colloid radius, surface charge, external electric field, etc.) are experimentally well accessible. Our analysis contributes to current studies of the structure and dynamics of systems governed by long-ranged interactions and points towards their experimental realizations via colloidal suspensions.Comment: Matches version accepted for publication. New refs. added, misprints corrected in figs.6,8,9,1

Study of corrections to the dust model via perturbation theory

This work reports on the application of the Eulerian perturbation theory to a recently proposed model of cosmological structure formation by gravitational instability (astro-ph/0009414). Its physical meaning is discussed in detail and put in perspective of previous works. The model incorporates in a systematic fashion corrections to the popular dust model due to multistreaming and, more generally, the small-scale, virialized degrees of freedom. It features a time-dependent length scale L(t) estimated to be L/r0 ~ 0.1 (r0(t) is the nonlinear scale, at which the density variance =1). The model provides a new angle on the dust model and allows to overcome some of its limitations. Thus, the scale L(t) works as a physically meaningful short-distance cutoff for the divergences appearing in the perturbation expansion of the dust model when there is too much initial power on small scales. The model also incorporates the generation of vorticity by tidal forces; according to the perturbational result, the filtered vorticity for standard CDM initial conditions should be significant today only at scales below ~ 1 Mpc/h.Comment: 9 pages, coincides with the published versio

Extending the scope of models for large-scale structure formation in the Universe

We propose a phenomenological generalization of the models of large-scale structure formation in the Universe by gravitational instability in two ways: we include pressure forces to model multi-streaming, and noise to model fluctuations due to neglected short-scale physical processes. We show that pressure gives rise to a viscous-like force of the same character as that one introduced in the ``adhesion model'', while noise leads to a roughening of the density field yielding a scaling behavior of its correlations.Comment: matches published version in A&A, incl. 3 figure