Astronomy Department Calendar

Understanding how galaxies evolve requires linking the small-scale physics of the interstellar medium (ISM) to the large-scale observables probed by current and next-generation telescopes. Molecular and fine-structure line emission trace distinct phases of the ISM (dense molecular clouds, diffuse atomic gas, and ionized regions), each encoding complementary information about star formation, gas conditions, and feedback. In this talk, I present SLICK, a multiphase ISM framework that couples cosmological simulations (such as IllustrisTNG and SIMBA) with physically motivated, cloud-scale radiative transfer to produce self-consistent predictions of line emission across the galaxy population. Rather than relying on a single subgrid prescription, SLICK explicitly models the density and radiation field structure of molecular clouds and connects them to a diffuse gas component, capturing the phase structure that shapes observed line ratios and luminosity functions. I will highlight applications of SLICK to CO spectral line energy distributions and fine-structure line emission from star-forming galaxies. I will also show how combining SLICK with simulation-based inference (SBI) enables constraints on molecular cloud properties from CO/[CII] observations, helping to break degeneracies that are difficult to resolve with traditional approaches. Finally, I will present line intensity mapping forecasts for experiments such as TIM and FYST, and outline the broader potential of this framework for interpreting next-generation surveys.