The THESAN project: Lyman-alpha intensity mapping of cosmic reionization

Abstract

Line Intensity Mapping (LIM) has garnered attention as a powerful cosmological probe, with next-generation instruments such as SPHEREx preparing to map the evolution of large-scale structure during the Epoch of Reionization (EoR). Lyman-alpha emission in the EoR is strongly shaped by resonant absorption from neutral hydrogen in the diffuse intergalactic medium (IGM), which transforms galactic sources into a low surface-brightness background. In this work, we leverage the state-of-the-art THESAN cosmological simulations to produce high-resolution theoretical predictions for future Lyman-alpha LIM studies, constructing continuous light cones for line-of-sight cosmological integrations. We assess the contributions of recombination, collisional excitation, and unresolved HII regions to the total Lyman-alpha spectral intensity. In addition, we explore the IGM in absorption at different redshifts using damping wing analysis. We produce channel maps exploring spatial fluctuations across redshift bands probe-able by LIM instruments. We find that the slope of the absorption-included Lyman-alpha fluctuation power spectrum at smaller scales (k > 10^(-2) 1/arcsec) steepens toward lower redshift, and that our emission-only Lyman-alpha power spectrum lies above the SPHEREx sensitivity, whereas the absorption-included signal is ~4 orders of magnitude lower--providing a conservative lower limit on inhomogeneity signatures and highlighting the importance of including resonant scattering in our model in the future. We also find that including outflows in a simple toy model boosts power by four orders of magnitude. We identify limitations in our analysis and propose next steps, including incorporating the effects of resonant Lyman-alpha scattering and line interlopers, as well as larger simulation volumes.