Formation of Dwarf Galaxies

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Dr Quinn and his team will modify their smoothed-particle hydrodynamic code to follow the formation of dwarf galaxies, by improving the resolution and including a treatment of dust and dense gas. The code follows the gravitational collapse of both dark matter and gas, and tracks heating and cooling of the gas to determine when it should form new stars. Improvements will include an approximation to follow the formation and destruction of dust and hydrogen molecules, and thus determine the gas cooling as the gas temperature drops below 10,000 K. This approximation will be tested and adjusted by comparing simulations with isolated Milky-Way-like galaxies and dwarf systems. The code will then be used to examine when star formation is quenched in the lowest-mass dark halos, leaving them without any stars to form a visible galaxy. Galaxies will be placed in their cosmological context by zooming-in on an interesting region of a larger-scale simulation, and following the development of that region at higher resolution. Simulated observations of the models will be generated, for comparison to observed galaxies.A graduate student will be trained by participating in the research. The team will continue its work with undergraduates in the University of Washington's "pre-map" program: this program is managed by science graduate students, and aims to attract under-represented students into science majors.