Detecting dark matter-dark energy coupling with the halo mass function

TL;DR

This study uses high-resolution simulations to identify how coupled dark matter and dark energy models alter the halo mass function, potentially allowing future surveys like DES to distinguish them from standard cosmology.

Contribution

The paper demonstrates that interacting dark matter-dark energy models produce measurable differences in the halo mass function, detectable by upcoming observational surveys.

Findings

Significant differences in halo mass function between coupled models and Lambda-CDM.

Dark Energy Survey can potentially distinguish these models within its observational constraints.

Independent measurements of sigma-8 are necessary to confirm the effects.

Abstract

We use high-resolution simulations of large-scale structure formation to analyze the effects of interacting dark matter and dark energy on the evolution of the halo mass function. Using a chi-square likelihood analysis, we find significant differences in the mass function between models of coupled dark matter-dark energy and standard concordance cosmology Lambda-CDM out to redshift z=1.5. We also find a preliminary indication that the Dark Energy Survey should be able to distinguish these models from Lambda-CDM within its mass and redshift contraints. While we can distinguish the effects of these models from Lambda-CDM cosmologies with different fundamental parameters, DES will require independent measurements of sigma-8 to confirm these effects.