23-10-2013 13 hs.
Cosmological simulations of galaxy formation
Dr. Leonardo Pellizza – IAR, CONICET
Resumen:
According to the standard cosmological model, the structure observed in the Universe arised from the growth of primordial density fluctuations. The process was mainly driven by gravitation, that produced the collapse of dark matter into halos. These halos grew and merged, clustering in a hierarchical way. Within them, baryonic matter cooled down and produced stars, leading to the formation of galaxies. The whole process is highly non-linear, involving the coupled dynamics of dark matter and baryons, and the thermodynamics of the latter. Hence, the best way to study it is through numerical simulations. In this talk, I will discuss the physics of the formation and evolution of galaxies, give an overview of the numerical tools developed to describe the process, and present some results to illustrate the power of these tools.