The Intergalactic Medium and Soft X-ray Background

I present an overview of some of the recent advances in our understanding of the distribution and evolution of the ordinary, baryonic matter in the universe. Two observations that strongly suggest that most of the baryons seen at high redshift (z ≥ 2) have turned into some forms yet undetected at z = 0 are highlighted. With the aid of large-scale cosmological hydrodynamic simulations, it is shown that most of the baryons today are in a gaseous form with a temperature of 10 − 10 Kelvin – the “warm/hot gas”, shock heated during the gravitational collapse and formation of the large-scale structure at low redshift. Primarily line emissions from this warm/hot gas may account for a large fraction of the residual (after removal of identifiable discrete sources) soft Xray background at hν < 1.0keV. How this warm/hot gas may be detected by the next generation of EUV and soft X-ray instruments is indicated. Detection or non-detection of this warm/hot gas will have profound implications for cosmology.