{"paper":{"title":"Constraints on the Evolution of the Ionizing Background and Ionizing Photon Mean Free Path at the End of Reionization","license":"http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/","headline":"","cross_cats":[],"primary_cat":"astro-ph.CO","authors_text":"Anna-Christina Eilers, Chiara Mazzucchelli, Fahad Nasir, Feige Wang, Frederick B. Davies, George D. Becker, Girish Kulkarni, Jinyi Yang, Joseph F. Hennawi, Laura C. Keating, Manuela Bischetti, Martin G. Haehnelt, Prakash Gaikwad, Samuel Lai, Sarah E. I. Bosman, Sindhu Satyavolu, Valentina D'Odorico, Yongda Zhu, YuXiang Qin","submitted_at":"2023-12-13T19:06:34Z","abstract_excerpt":"The variations in Ly$\\alpha$ forest opacity observed at $z>5.3$ between lines of sight to different background quasars are too strong to be caused by fluctuations in the density field alone. The leading hypothesis for the cause of this excess variance is a late, ongoing reionization process at redshifts below six. Another model proposes strong ionizing background fluctuations coupled to a short, spatially varying mean free path of ionizing photons, without explicitly invoking incomplete reionization. With recent observations suggesting a short mean free path at $z\\sim6$, and a dramatic improve"},"claims":{"count":0,"items":[],"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"source":{"id":"2312.08464","kind":"arxiv","version":1},"verdict":{"id":null,"model_set":{},"created_at":null,"strongest_claim":"","one_line_summary":"","pipeline_version":null,"weakest_assumption":"","pith_extraction_headline":""},"integrity":{"clean":true,"summary":{"advisory":0,"critical":0,"by_detector":{},"informational":0},"endpoint":"/pith/2312.08464/integrity.json","findings":[],"available":true,"detectors_run":[],"snapshot_sha256":"c28c3603d3b5d939e8dc4c7e95fa8dfce3d595e45f758748cecf8e644a296938"},"references":{"count":0,"sample":[],"resolved_work":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57","internal_anchors":0},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}