The evolution of large-scale structure in a universe dominated by cold dark matter

Abstract

The results of numerical simulations of nonlinear gravitational clustering in universes dominated by weakly interacting, 'cold' dark matter are presented. The numerical methods used and the way in which initial conditions were generated are described, and the simulations performed are catalogued. The evolution of the fundamental statistical properties of the models is described and their comparability with observation is discussed. Graphical comparisons of these open models with the observed galaxy distribution in a large redshift survey are made. It is concluded that a model with a cosmological density parameter omega equal to one is quite unacceptable if galaxies trace the mass distribution, and that models with omega of roughly two, while better, still do not provide a fully acceptable match with observation. Finally, a situation in which galaxy formation is suppressed except in sufficiently dense regions is modelled which leads to models which can agree with observation quite well even for omega equal to one.