Simulating intergalactic quasar scintillation

Understand

Intergalactic scintillation of distant quasars is sensitive to free electrons and therefore complements Ly$\alpha$ absorption line experiments probing the neutral intergalactic medium (IGM).

• We present a new scheme to compute IGM refractive scintillation effects on distant sources in combination with Adaptive Mesh Refinement cosmological simulations.
• First we validate our model by reproducing the well-known interstellar scintillation (ISS) of Galactic sources.
• The simulated cosmic density field is then used to infer the statistical properties of intergalactic scintillation.