Insights into Cosmological Reionization from Quasar Absorption Spectra

Nov 29, 2018 11:00 AM to Nov 29, 2018 12:00 PM at Building 8 - Room 241

When the first galaxies emerged, ~100 - 500 million years after the Big Bang, their starlight likely reionized and heated the intergalactic hydrogen that had existed since cosmological recombination.  Much is currently unknown about this process, including what spatial structure it had, when it started and completed, and even which sources drove it.  I will discuss what the spectra of distant quasars are telling us about reionization, including the possibility that its tail end may already have been observed in the z~5.5 Lyman-alpha forest.