The observable signature of late heating of the Universe during cosmic reionization.

Models and simulations of the epoch of reionization predict that spectra of the 21-centimetre transition of atomic hydrogen will show a clear fluctuation peak, at a redshift and scale, respectively, that mark the central stage of reionization and the characteristic size of ionized bubbles. This is based on the assumption that the cosmic gas was heated by stellar remnants-particularly X-ray binaries-to temperatures well above the cosmic microwave background at that time (about 30 kelvin). Here we show instead that the hard spectra (that is, spectra with more high-energy photons than low-energy photons) of X-ray binaries make such heating ineffective, resulting in a delayed and spatially uniform heating that modifies the 21-centimetre signature of reionization.

The signature of the first stars in atomic hydrogen at redshift 20.

Dark and baryonic matter moved at different velocities in the early Universe, which strongly suppressed star formation in some regions. This was estimated to imprint a large-scale fluctuation signal of about two millikelvin in the 21-centimetre spectral line of atomic hydrogen associated with stars at a redshift of 20, although this estimate ignored the critical contribution of gas heating due to X-rays and major enhancements of the suppression. A large velocity difference reduces the abundance of haloes and requires the first stars to form in haloes of about a million solar masses, substantially greater than previously expected.