# computational astrophysics

## Tracing the first stars and galaxies of the Milky Way

We use 30 high-resolution dark matter haloes of the Caterpillar simulation suite to probe the first stars and galaxies of Milky Way-mass systems. We quantify the environment of the high-z progenitors of the Milky Way and connect them to the properties of the host and satellites today.

## The Caterpillar Project: A Large Suite of Milky Way Sized Halos

We present the largest number of Milky Way sized dark matter halos simulated at very high mass ($\sim$\ $10^4$ \Msol/particle) and temporal resolution (5 Myrs/snapshot) done to date, quadrupling what is currently available in the literature.

## The inhomogeneous reionization of the local intergalactic medium by metal-poor globular clusters

We present detailed radiative transfer simulations of the reionization of the Milky Way by metal-poor globular clusters. We identify potential metal-poor globular cluster candidates within the Aquarius simulation using dark matter halo velocity dispersions. We calculate the local ionization fields via a photon-conserving, three dimensional non-equilibrium chemistry code. The key feature of the model is that globular cluster formation is suppressed if the local gas is ionized. We assume that at these early times, the ionization field is dominated by the flux from metal-poor globular clusters. Our spatial treatment of the ionization field leads to drastically different numbers and spatial distributions when compared to models where globular cluster formation is simply truncated at early redshifts (z ̃ 13).

## Globular cluster formation within the Aquarius simulation

We present the largest number of Milky Way sized dark matter halos simulated at very high mass ($\sim$\ $10^4$ \Msol/particle) and temporal resolution (5 Myrs/snapshot) done to date, quadrupling what is currently available in the literature.