Effects of baryons on the dark matter distribution in cosmological hydrodynamical simulations

Abstract

Simulations including solely dark matter performed over the last three decades have delivered an accurate and robust description of the cosmic web and dark matter structures. With the advent of more precise cosmological probes, planned and ongoing, and dark matter detection experiments, this numerical modelling has to be improved to incorporate the complex non-linear and energetic processes taking place during galaxy formation. We use the ``Evolution and Assembly of GaLaxies and their Environment'' (EAGLE) suite of cosmological simulations to investigate the effects of baryons and astrophysical processes on the underlying dark matter distribution. Many effects are expected and we investigate (i): the modification of the profile of halos from the Navarro-Frenk-White profile shape found in collisionless simulations, including the changes in the dark matter profiles themselves, (ii) the changes of the inner density profiles of rich clusters, where observations have suggested a deviation from the standard cold dark matter paradigm, (iii) the offset created by astrophysical process between the centre of galaxies and the centre of the dark matter halo in which they reside and, (iv) the changes in the shape of the dark matter profile due to baryons in the centre of Milky Way halos and the impact these changes have on the morphology of the annihilation signal that could be observed as an indirect proof of the existence of dark matter. In all cases we find that the baryons play a significant role and change the results found in collisionless simulations dramatically. This highlights the need for more simulations like EAGLE to better understand and analyse future cosmology surveys. We also conduct a thorough study of the hydrodynamics solver parameters used in these simulations, assess their impact on the simulated galaxy population and show how robust some of the EAGLE results are against such variations.