Baryons in the Darkest Sites of the Universe
宇宙最暗处的重子
The pristine underdense patches of the Universe, cosmic voids, are powerful cosmological laboratories, uniquely sensitive to dark energy, modified gravity, and neutrino masses, yet their baryonic content remains uncharacterized. We present the first constraint on baryon underdensity in voids, exploiting the dispersion measures (DMs) of fast radio bursts (FRBs) as tracers of the electron column. By stacking 3455 sight lines from CHIME/FRB with ∼15' localizations on 1228 Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) BOSS voids over redshifts 0.2 < z < 0.7, we measure a DM deficit toward void centers at 3.2σ significance, indicating that diffuse baryons inhabit the emptiest corners of the cosmic web at a suppressed level. The measured signal amplitude is consistent with an effective Universe model built directly from the observed galaxy underdensity in these voids, and a baryonic model calibrated to the FRB DM─redshift relation (α<SUB>v</SUB> = 1.80 ± 0.87). A uniform-density void model yields an electron density contrast of δ<SUB>e,v</SUB> = −0.58 ± 0.30, implying a tentative ∼60% ± 30% underdensity of baryons in void interiors relative to the cosmic mean. Jointly interpreting our FRB measurement with existing stacks of the thermal Sunyaev─Zel'dovich effect on voids further constrains the mean gas temperature to T<SUB>e</SUB> ≲ (1.1 ± 0.7) × 10<SUP>6</SUP> K, pointing to a warm-hot diffuse phase, consistent with hydrodynamical simulations. With forthcoming FRB and galaxy surveys, this approach opens a new window onto baryon mapping, with direct implications for feedback models governing gas expulsion into low-density environments, and for the use of cosmic voids to extract cosmological constraints.
展开 ▾首次将FRB应用于宇宙空洞的欠密度测量,提供了不依赖气体相态、温度、金属丰度的直接重子密度约束,为反馈模型与空洞宇宙学奠定基础。
宇宙空洞的重子含量此前主要通过tSZ效应探测到热气体亏损(Alonso+ 2018、Li+ 2024),但缺乏直接的重子密度测量。FRB的色散量已广泛用于过密结构研究(Wang+ 2025、Sharma+ 2026b),本文首次将其应用于空洞欠密度探测,利用Mao+ 2017的SDSS空洞目录,通过3.2σ的DM亏损信号约束了空洞内重子密度约为宇宙均值的∼40%,并与tSZ堆叠结合限定气体温度约10^6 K,与模拟预测(Haider+ 2016、Martizzi+ 2019)一致。未来更大FRB样本与下一代星系巡天相结合,将实现空洞重子的层析绘图,并检验恒星反馈与活动星系核反馈模型。
预印本 2026-05-03 · 接收 2026-06-24 · 刊出 2026-07-10 · 收录 2026-07-22