Effect of halo bias and Lyman Limit Systems on the history of cosmic reionization

TL;DR

This paper enhances an analytical reionization model by incorporating source bias and Lyman Limit systems, demonstrating that realistic models can align with multiple observational constraints across cosmic history.

Contribution

It introduces an extended analytical model of reionization that includes source bias and absorption effects, consistent with various observational data.

Findings

Model aligns with galaxy luminosity function evolution

Model is consistent with WMAP, SPT, and EDGES constraints

Reionization can be modeled realistically within observational limits

Abstract

We extend the existing analytical model of reionization by Furlanetto et al. (2004) to include the biasing of reionization sources and additional absorption by Lyman Limit systems. Our model is, by construction, consistent with the observed evolution of the galaxy luminosity function at z<8 and with the observed evolution of Ly-{\alpha} forest at z<6. We also find that, for a wide range of values for the relative escape fraction that we consider reasonable, and which are consistent with the observational constraints on the relative escape fraction from lower redshifts, our reionization model is consistent with the WMAP constraint on the Thompson optical depth and with the SPT and EDGES constraints on the duration of reionization. We, therefore, conclude that it is possible to develop physically realistic models of reionization that are consistent with all existing observational constraints.