The Role of Cold Flows and Reservoirs in Galaxy Formation With Strong Feedback

Abstract

We examine gas accretion and subsequent star formation in representative galaxies from the McMaster Unbiased Galaxy Simulations (Stinson et al. 2010). Accreted gas is bimodal with a natural temperature division at $10^5$ K, near the peak of the cooling curve. Cold-mode accretion dominates inflows at early times, creating a peak in total accretion at redshift z=2-4 and declining exponentially below z$\sim$2. Hot-mode accretion peaks near z=1-2 and declines gradually. Hot-mode exceeds cold-mode accretion at z$\sim$1.8 for all four galaxies rather than when the galaxy reaches a characteristic mass. Cold-mode accretion can fuel immediate star formation, while hot-mode accretion preferentially builds a large, hot gas reservoir in the halo. Late-time star formation relies on reservoir gas accreted 2-8 Gyr prior. Thus, the reservoir allows the star formation rate to surpass the current overall gas accretion rate. Stellar feedback cycles gas from the interstellar medium back into the hot reservoir. Stronger feedback results in more gas cycling, gas removal in a galactic outflow and less star formation overall, enabling simulations to match the observed star formation history. For lower mass galaxies in particular, strong feedback can delay the star formation peak to z=1-2 from the accretion peak at z=2-4.

arXiv comment10 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (40)

• Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Three Year Results: Implications for Cosmology
• How Do Galaxies Get Their Gas?
• The Average Star Formation Histories of Galaxies in Dark Matter Halos from z=0-8
• The Formation of Galactic Disks
• Galaxy Bimodality due to Cold Flows and Shock Heating
• Cold streams in early massive hot haloes as the main mode of galaxy formation
• Galactic star formation and accretion histories from matching galaxies to dark matter haloes
• How Filaments are Woven into the Cosmic Web
• Virial shocks in galactic haloes?
• Semi-Analytic Modelling of Galaxy Formation: The Local Universe
• The Structure and Kinematics of the Circum-Galactic Medium from Far-UV Spectra of z~2-3 Galaxies
• Where are the Baryons?
• Ahf: Amiga's Halo Finder
• A Recipe for Galaxy Formation Shaun Cole
• Baryons in the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium
• Galaxies in a simulated $\Lambda$CDM Universe I: cold mode and hot cores
• Star Formation and Feedback in Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamic Simulations--I. Isolated Galaxies
• Gasoline: An adaptable implementation of TreeSPH
• The Aquila comparison Project: The Effects of Feedback and Numerical Methods on Simulations of Galaxy Formation
• Making Galaxies in a Cosmological Context: The Need for Early Stellar Feedback
• The Enrichment of the Intergalactic Medium with Adiabatic Feedback I: Metal Cooling and Metal Diffusion
• Moving mesh cosmology: tracing cosmological gas accretion
• The Role of Cold Flows in the Assembly of Galaxy Disks
• Bimodal gas accretion in the Horizon-MareNostrum galaxy formation simulation
• On Formation and Evolution of Disk Galaxies: Cosmological Initial Conditions and the Gravitational Collapse
• Orbiting Circum-galactic Gas as a Signature of Cosmological Accretion
• The Small Covering Factor of Cold Accretion Streams
• Cosmological Galaxy Formation Simulations Using SPH
• The Population of Weak MgII Absorbers. II The Properties of Single-Cloud Systems
• An excursion set model of the cosmic web: The abundance of sheets, filaments and halos
• Preheating by Previrialization and its Impact on Galaxy Formation
• Observing the End of Cold Flow Accretion using Halo Absorption Systems
• EVLA Observations of Galactic Supernova Remnants: Wide-field Continuum and Spectral-index Imaging
• Metal-Poor, Cool Gas in the Circumgalactic Medium of a z = 2.4 Star-Forming Galaxy: Direct Evidence for Cold Accretion?
• Gravitational Instability of Cold Matter
• Are cold flows detectable with metal absorption lines?
• Constraining the Star Formation Histories in Dark Matter Halos: I. Central Galaxies
• The formation of galaxy disks in a hierarchical universe
• Intergalactic baryon-rich regions at high redshift
• Disk Galaxy Evolution Along the Hubble Sequence

Cited by in corpus (28)

• Theoretical Challenges in Galaxy Formation
• The splashback radius as a physical halo boundary and the growth of halo mass
• In-N-Out: the gas cycle from dwarfs to spiral galaxies
• Building Late-Type Spiral Galaxies by In-Situ and Ex-Situ Star Formation
• QSO MUSEUM I: A sample of 61 extended Ly$\alpha$-emission nebulae surrounding $z\sim 3$ quasars
• The impact of feedback on cosmological gas accretion
• First gas-phase metallicity gradients of $0.1\lesssim z\lesssim 0.8$ galaxies with MUSE
• Phylogeny of the Milky Way's inner disk and bulge populations: Implications for gas accretion, (the lack of) inside-out thick disk formation, and quenching
• Cosmological Galaxy Evolution with Superbubble Feedback I: Realistic Galaxies with Moderate Feedback
• Bimodality of [α/Fe]-[Fe/H] distributions is a natural outcome of dissipative collapse and disc growth in Milky Way-type galaxies
• Revisiting long-standing puzzles of the Milky Way: the Sun and its vicinity as typical outer disk chemical evolution
• Tracing Outflowing Metals in Simulations of Dwarf and Spiral Galaxies
• The physical nature of the cosmic accretion of baryons and dark matter into halos and their galaxies
• Cosmological Galaxy Evolution with Superbubble Feedback II: The Limits of Supernovae
• Impact of filaments on galaxy formation in their residing dark matter haloes
• Where did the globular clusters of the Milky Way form? Insights from the E-MOSAICS simulations
• The impact of feedback and the hot halo on the rates of gas accretion onto galaxies
• Rivers of Gas I.: Unveiling The Properties of High Redshift Filaments
• Distribution of streaming rates into high-redshift galaxies
• From HI to Stars: HI Depletion in Starbursts and Star-Forming Galaxies in the ALFALFA H-alpha Survey
• From EMBER to FIRE: predicting high resolution baryon fields from dark matter simulations with Deep Learning
• Diffuse coronae in cosmological simulations of Milky Way-sized galaxies
• A Fundamental Test for Galaxy Formation Models: Matching the Lyman-$\alpha$ Absorption Profiles of Galactic Halos over Three Decades in Distance
• The AGORA High-resolution Galaxy Simulations Comparison Project. VI. Similarities and Differences in the Circumgalactic Medium
• The history of stellar metallicity in a simulated disc galaxy
• Barlenses in the CALIFA survey: combining the photometric and stellar population analysis
• Positive feedback at the disc-halo interface
• Dissecting Cosmological Filaments at High Redshifts: Emergence of Spaghetti-type Flow Inside DM Haloes