Semi-analytic forecasts for galaxy formation and cosmic reionization in the ultrahigh-redshift universe

Concerning the early evolution history of our universe and distant galaxies that are expected to be uncovered with future telescopes, we present a collection of comprehensive, physically-backed forecasts for galaxy populations across cosmic time and their interaction with the cosmic environment. Our predictions cover galaxies spanning a remarkably wide range of mass and redshift, for which we provide a large variety of physical and observable properties, and from which we derive the production rate of energetic photons and the subsequent reionization history. These pre-eminent results are achieved with a custom-built modelling pipeline based on the versatile Santa Cruz semi-analytic model for galaxy formation and the new model components introduced in this work. This efficient modelling pipeline established an effective link between the ‘ground-level’ galaxy formation physics and the ‘top-level’ cosmological-scale observables, which also enables controlled experiments that help pinpoint the set of physical processes that have leading effects on cosmological events and quantifying their impacts. This work demonstrates the enormous potential of using semi-analytic models to inform the planning of optimal survey strategies, support scientific rationale for observing programs, and facilitate physical interpretation for observed objects. In anticipation of the soon-to-be-launched James Webb Space Telescope, a portion of our predictions are tailored to explore its capability on detecting faint, distant galaxies and on constraining key galaxy formation physics.Ph.D.Includes bibliographical reference