The Origin of Angular Momentum in Dark Matter Halos

Abstract

We propose a new explanation for the origin of angular momentum in galaxies and their dark halos, in which the halos obtain their spin through the cumulative acquisition of angular momentum from satellite accretion. In our model, the buildup of angular momentum is a random walk process associated with the mass assembly history of the halo's major progenitor. We assume no correlation between the angular momenta of accreted objects. The main role of tidal torques in this approach is to produce the random tangential velocities of merging satellites. Using the extended Press-Schechter approximation, we calculate the growth of mass, angular momentum, and spin parameter λ for many halos. Our random walk model reproduces the key features of the angular momentum of halos found in ΛCDM N-body simulations: a lognormal distribution in λ with an average of ≈ 0.045 and dispersion σλ = 0.56, independent of mass and redshift. The evolution of the spin parameter in individual halos in this model is quite different from the steady increase with time of angular momentum in the tidal torque picture. We find both in N-body simulations and in our random walk model that the value of λ changes significantly with time for a halo's major progenitor. It typically has a sharp increase due to major mergers and a steady decline during periods of gradual accretion of small satellites. The model predicts that, on average, the λ of ~1012 M☉ halos that had major mergers after redshift z = 3 should be substantially larger than the λ of those that did not. Perhaps surprisingly, this suggests that halos that host later forming elliptical galaxies should rotate faster than halos of spiral galaxies.