Dark matter in astrophysics/cosmology

Green, Anne M.

Abstract

These lecture notes aim to provide an introduction to dark matter from the perspective of astrophysics/cosmology. We start with a rapid overview of cosmology, including the evolution of the Universe, its thermal history and structure formation. Then we look at the observational evidence for dark matter, from observations of galaxies, galaxy clusters, the anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation and large scale structure. To detect dark matter we need to know how it’s distributed, in particular in the Milky Way, so next we overview relevant results from numerical simulations and observations. Finally, we conclude by looking at what astrophysical and cosmological observations can tell us about the nature of dark matter, focusing on two particular cases: warm and self-interacting dark matter.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 22, 2021
• Online Publication Date: Jan 25, 2022
• Publication Date: Jan 25, 2022
• Deposit Date: May 9, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: May 10, 2022
• Journal: SciPost Physics Lecture Notes
• Electronic ISSN: 2590-1990
• Publisher: Stichting SciPost
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Issue: 37
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.21468/SciPostPhysLectNotes.37
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/7760560
• Publisher URL: https://scipost.org/10.21468/SciPostPhysLectNotes.37