Splashback Radius of Dark Matter Halo

Introduction

  • Read the introduction by Benedikt Diemer on his webpage: > “…A more natural halo boundary is provided by the splashback radius, \(R_{\rm sp}\), the radius where particles reach the apocenter of their first orbit after infall…Particles at the apocenter of their first orbit pile up due to their low radial velocity, creating a caustic that manifests itself as a sharp drop in the density profile. This so-called splashback radius represents a clear boundary between matter orbiting in the halo and matter on a first infall toward the halo.”

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Observational constraints

Chang2018 (Figure from Chang et al. 2018. Claimed detection of splashback radius around redMaPPer clusters using DES)