On the Direct Detectability of the Cosmic Dark Ages: 21 Centimeter Emission from Minihalos

Abstract

In the standard Cold Dark Matter (CDM) theory of structure formation, virialized minihalos (with T_vir}<10^4 K) form in abundance at high redshift (z>6), during the cosmic ``dark ages.'' The hydrogen in these minihalos, the first nonlinear baryonic structures to form in the universe, is mostly neutral and sufficiently hot and dense to emit strongly at the 21-cm line. We calculate the emission from individual minihalos and the radiation background contributed by their combined effect. Minihalos create a ``21-cm forest'' of emission lines. We predict that the angular fluctuations in this 21-cm background should be detectable with the planned LOFAR and SKA radio arrays, thus providing a direct probe of structure formation during the ``dark ages.'' Such a detection will serve to confirm the basic CDM paradigm while constraining the shape of the power-spectrum of primordial density fluctuations down to much smaller scales than have previously been constrained, the onset and duration of the reionization epoch, and the conditions which led to the first stars and quasars. We present results here for the currently-favored, flat $\Lambda$CDM model, for different tilts of the primordial power spectrum.