How Cosmic Web Environment Affects Galaxy Quenching Across Cosmic Time
First author: Farhanul Hasan
We investigate how cosmic web structures affect galaxy quenching in the IllustrisTNG (TNG-100) cosmological simulations by reconstructing the cosmic web in each snapshot using the DisPerSE framework. We measure the distance from each galaxy with stellar mass log(M*/Msun)>=8 to the nearest node (dnode) and the nearest filament spine (dfil) and study the dependence of both median specific star formation rate () and median gas fraction () on these distances. We find that of galaxies is only dependent on cosmic web environment at z<2, with the dependence increasing with time. At z<=0.5, 8<=log(M*/Msun)<9 galaxies are quenched at dnode<1 Mpc, and significantly star formation-suppressed at dfil<1 Mpc, trends which are driven mostly by satellite galaxies. At z<=1, in contrast to the monotonic rise in of log(M*/Msun)<10 galaxies with dnode and dfil, log(M*/Msun)>=10 galaxies actually experience an upturn in at dnode<0.2 Mpc (this is caused by both satellites and centrals). Much of this cosmic web-dependence of star formation activity can be explained by the evolution in . Our results suggest that in the past ~10 Gyr, low-mass satellites are quenched by rapid gas stripping in dense environments near nodes and gradual gas starvation in intermediate-density environments near filaments, while at earlier times cosmic web structures efficiently channeled cold gas into most galaxies. State-of-the-art ongoing spectroscopic surveys such as SDSS and DESI, as well as those planned with JWST and Roman are required to test our predictions against observations.