Cosmological cooling of gas within dark matter halos

Abstract

This project explores the physics of radiative cooling in a cosmological context, focusing on the connection between cooling efficiency and halo mass. We begin by reviewing the main cooling mechanisms and their impact in the cooling function Λ(Z, T). Then, we derive the analytical expressions for the cooling time tcool, highlighting its dependence on gas density and radius. Finally, we implement a numerical code in Fortran to estimate the cooling radius for halos in the range 108.6 − 1015 M⊙ masses. Additionally, we compute the cooling time as a function of radius for a fixed halo mass. These results allow us to identify the regions where gas can effectively cool and potentially form stars.