Minimum size of 21-cm simulations

Cosmic 21cm interferometry is set to revolutionize our understanding of the Epoch of Reionization (EoR) and the Cosmic Dawn (CD). However, the signal has structure on a huge range of scales, requiring large simulation boxes to statistically capture the relevant fields. In this work, we quantify the minimum box size for simulating the power spectrum (PS) of the 21cm signal. We perform multiple realizations of the initial conditions, for a range of box sizes. We quantify convergence with respect to a simulation that is 1.1 Gpc on a side, with thermal noise computed for a 1000 h integration with SKA1-low. We find that simulations of box lengths 200–300 Mpc underestimate the large-scale power during the CD by ∼7–9 per cent on average. We conclude that box lengths of L ≳ 250 Mpc are needed to converge at the level of ≲1σ of the total noise.