6 papers · 1 filter
A hidden reionization prior biases cosmological inference
Zihan Wang, Huanyuan Shan
Precision cosmology assumes that cosmic reionization was a single smooth transition. We show that this assumption is in tension with current observations: the Planck optical depth,…
Steep Redshift Evolution of the Ionizing Escape Fraction at --: Empirical Constraints and Comparison with Simulations
Zihan Wang, Huanyuan Shan
The ionizing photon escape fraction governs cosmic reionization yet remains observationally unconstrained as a function of halo mass. We present the first empirical c…
The JWST early galaxy crisis resolved by a reionization degeneracy
Zihan Wang, Huanyuan Shan
JWST's discovery of unexpectedly bright galaxies has triggered claims that standard CDM cannot reproduce their abundances, while estimates of the ionizing escape fraction…
A structural degeneracy explains reionization tensions and limits dark matter constraints
Zihan Wang, Huanyuan Shan
Over the past decade, reionization studies have yielded persistent factor-of-two-to-five disagreements in the inferred ionizing escape fraction and peak star for…
Reionization Topology as a Probe of Self-Interacting Dark Matter
Zihan Wang
The topology of cosmic reionization, the sizes, shapes, and connectivity of ionized bubbles is a primary observable of next-generation 21\,cm experiments. We show that this topolog…
LensAgent: A Self Evolving Agent for Autonomous Physical Inference of Sub-galactic Structure
Xiaotang Feng, Zihan Wang, Zilang Shu +2
Probing dark matter distribution on sub-galactic scales is essential for testing the Cold Dark Matter (CDM) paradigm. Strong gravitational lensing, as one of the most powerful a…