44 research outputs found
Fisher Formalism For Anisotropic Gravitational-Wave Background Searches With Pulsar Timing Arrays
Pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) are currently the only experiments directly sensitive to gravitational waves with decade-long periods. Within the next five to ten years, PTAs are expected to detect the stochastic gravitational-wave background (SGWB) collectively sourced by inspiraling supermassive black hole binaries. It is expected that this background is mostly isotropic, and current searches focus on the monopole part of the SGWB. Looking ahead, anisotropies in the SGWB may provide a trove of additional information on both known and unknown astrophysical and cosmological sources. In this paper, we build a simple yet realistic Fisher formalism for anisotropic SGWB searches with PTAs. Our formalism is able to accommodate realistic properties of PTAs and allows simple and accurate forecasts. We illustrate our approach with an idealized PTA consisting of identical, isotropically distributed pulsars. In a companion paper, we apply our formalism to current PTAs and show that it can be a powerful tool to guide and optimize real data analysis
Insights Into Searches For Anisotropies In The Nanohertz Gravitational-Wave Background
Within the next several years pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) are positioned to detect the stochastic gravitational-wave background (GWB) likely produced by the collection of inspiralling supermassive black holes binaries, and potentially constrain some exotic physics. So far most of the pulsar timing data analysis has focused on the monopole of the GWB, assuming it is perfectly isotropic. The natural next step is to search for anisotropies in the GWB. In this paper, we use the recently developed PTA Fisher matrix to gain insights into optimal search strategies for GWB anisotropies. For concreteness, we apply our results to the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA) data, using realistic noise characteristics of its pulsars. We project the detectability of a GWB whose angular dependence is assumed to be a linear combination of predetermined maps, such as spherical harmonics or coarse pixels. We find that the GWB monopole is always statistically correlated with these maps, implying a loss of sensitivity to the monopole when searching simultaneously for anisotropies. We then derive the angular distributions of the GWB intensity to which a PTA is most sensitive, and illustrate how one may use these “principal maps” to approximately reconstruct the angular dependence of the GWB. Since the principal maps are neither perfectly anisotropic nor uncorrelated with the monopole, we also develop a frequentist criterion to specifically search for anisotropies in the GWB without any prior knowledge about their angular distribution. Lastly, we show how to recover existing EPTA results with our Fisher formalism, and clarify their meaning. The tools presented here will be valuable in guiding and optimizing the computationally demanding analyses of pulsar timing data
HyRec: A fast and highly accurate primordial hydrogen and helium recombination code
We present a state-of-the-art primordial recombination code, HyRec, including
all the physical effects that have been shown to significantly affect
recombination. The computation of helium recombination includes simple analytic
treatments of hydrogen continuum opacity in the He I 2 1P - 1 1S line, the He
I] 2 3P - 1 1S line, and treats feedback between these lines within the
on-the-spot approximation. Hydrogen recombination is computed using the
effective multilevel atom method, virtually accounting for an infinite number
of excited states. We account for two-photon transitions from 2s and higher
levels as well as frequency diffusion in Lyman-alpha with a full radiative
transfer calculation. We present a new method to evolve the radiation field
simultaneously with the level populations and the free electron fraction. These
computations are sped up by taking advantage of the particular sparseness
pattern of the equations describing the radiative transfer. The computation
time for a full recombination history is ~2 seconds. This makes our code well
suited for inclusion in Monte Carlo Markov chains for cosmological parameter
estimation from upcoming high-precision cosmic microwave background anisotropy
measurements.Comment: Version accepted by PRD. Numerical integration switches adapted to be
well behaved for a wide range of cosmologies (Sec. V E). HyRec is available
at http://www.tapir.caltech.edu/~yacine/hyrec/hyrec.htm
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CMB B -mode non-Gaussianity
We study the degree to which the cosmic microwave background (CMB) can be used to constrain primordial non-Gaussianity involving one tensor and two scalar fluctuations, focusing on the correlation of one polarization B mode with two temperature modes. In the simplest models of inflation, the tensor-scalar-scalar primordial bispectrum is nonvanishing and is of the same order in slow-roll parameters as the scalar-scalar-scalar bispectrumr. We calculate the {BTT} correlation arising from a primordial tensor-scalar-scalar bispectrum, and show that constraints from an experiment like CMB-Stage IV using this observable are more than an order of magnitude better than those on the same primordial coupling obtained from temperature measurements alone. We argue that B-mode non-Gaussianity opens up an as-yet-unexplored window into the early Universe, demonstrating that significant information on primordial physics remains to be harvested from CMB anisotropies
Ultrafast effective multi-level atom method for primordial hydrogen recombination
Cosmological hydrogen recombination has recently been the subject of renewed
attention because of its importance for predicting the power spectrum of cosmic
microwave background anisotropies. It has become clear that it is necessary to
account for a large number n >~ 100 of energy shells of the hydrogen atom,
separately following the angular momentum substates in order to obtain
sufficiently accurate recombination histories. However, the multi-level atom
codes that follow the populations of all these levels are computationally
expensive, limiting recent analyses to only a few points in parameter space. In
this paper, we present a new method for solving the multi-level atom
recombination problem, which splits the problem into a computationally
expensive atomic physics component that is independent of the cosmology, and an
ultrafast cosmological evolution component. The atomic physics component
follows the network of bound-bound and bound-free transitions among excited
states and computes the resulting effective transition rates for the small set
of "interface" states radiatively connected to the ground state. The
cosmological evolution component only follows the populations of the interface
states. By pre-tabulating the effective rates, we can reduce the recurring cost
of multi-level atom calculations by more than 5 orders of magnitude. The
resulting code is fast enough for inclusion in Markov Chain Monte Carlo
parameter estimation algorithms. It does not yet include the radiative transfer
or high-n two-photon processes considered in some recent papers. Further work
on analytic treatments for these effects will be required in order to produce a
recombination code usable for Planck data analysis.Comment: Version accepted by Phys. Rev. D. Proof of equivalence of effective
and standard MLA methods moved to the main text. Some rewording
Radiative transfer effects in primordial hydrogen recombination
The calculation of a highly accurate cosmological recombination history has
been the object of particular attention recently, as it constitutes the major
theoretical uncertainty when predicting the angular power spectrum of Cosmic
Microwave Background anisotropies. Lyman transitions, in particular the
Lyman-alpha line, have long been recognized as one of the bottlenecks of
recombination, due to their very low escape probabilities. The Sobolev
approximation does not describe radiative transfer in the vicinity of Lyman
lines to a sufficient degree of accuracy, and several corrections have already
been computed in other works. In this paper, the impact of some previously
ignored radiative transfer effects is calculated. First, the effect of Thomson
scattering in the vicinity of the Lyman-alpha line is evaluated, using a full
redistribution kernel incorporated into a radiative transfer code. The effect
of feedback of distortions generated by the optically thick deuterium
Lyman-alpha line blueward of the hydrogen line is investigated with an analytic
approximation. It is shown that both effects are negligible during cosmological
hydrogen recombination. Secondly, the importance of high-lying, non overlapping
Lyman transitions is assessed. It is shown that escape from lines above
Ly-gamma and frequency diffusion in Ly-beta and higher lines can be neglected
without loss of accuracy. Thirdly, a formalism generalizing the Sobolev
approximation is developed to account for the overlap of the high-lying Lyman
lines, which is shown to lead to negligible changes to the recombination
history. Finally, the possibility of a cosmological hydrogen recombination
maser is investigated. It is shown that there is no such maser in the purely
radiative treatment presented here.Comment: 23 pages, 4 figures, to be submitted to PR
Spitzer characterisation of dust in an anomalous emission region: the Perseus cloud
Anomalous microwave emission is known to exist in the Perseus cloud. One of
the most promising candidates to explain this excess of emission is electric
dipole radiation from rapidly rotating very small dust grains, commonly
referred to as spinning dust. Photometric data obtained with the Spitzer Space
Telescope have been reprocessed and used in conjunction with the dust emission
model DUSTEM to characterise the properties of the dust within the cloud. This
analysis has allowed us to constrain spatial variations in the strength of the
interstellar radiation field (), the mass abundances of the
PAHs and VSGs relative to the BGs (Y and Y), the
column density of hydrogen (N) and the equilibrium dust
temperature (T). The parameter maps of Y,
Y and are the first of their kind to be
produced for the Perseus cloud, and we used these maps to investigate the
physical conditions in which anomalous emission is observed. We find that in
regions of anomalous emission the strength of the ISRF, and consequently the
equilibrium temperature of the dust, is enhanced while there is no significant
variation in the abundances of the PAHs and the VSGs or the column density of
hydrogen. We interpret these results as an indication that the enhancement in
might be affecting the properties of the small
stochastically heated dust grains resulting in an increase in the spinning dust
emission observed at 33 GHz. This is the first time that such an investigation
has been performed, and we believe that this type of analysis creates a new
perspective in the field of anomalous emission studies, and represents a
powerful new tool for constraining spinning dust models.Comment: 13 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA
A New Era in the Quest for Dark Matter
There is a growing sense of `crisis' in the dark matter community, due to the
absence of evidence for the most popular candidates such as weakly interacting
massive particles, axions, and sterile neutrinos, despite the enormous effort
that has gone into searching for these particles. Here, we discuss what we have
learned about the nature of dark matter from past experiments, and the
implications for planned dark matter searches in the next decade. We argue that
diversifying the experimental effort, incorporating astronomical surveys and
gravitational wave observations, is our best hope to make progress on the dark
matter problem.Comment: Published in Nature, online on 04 Oct 2018. 13 pages, 1 figur
Snowmass2021 theory frontier white paper: Astrophysical and cosmological probes of dark matter
While astrophysical and cosmological probes provide a remarkably precise and consistent picture of the quantity and general properties of dark matter, its fundamental nature remains one of the most significant open questions in physics. Obtaining a more comprehensive understanding of dark matter within the next decade will require overcoming a number of theoretical challenges: the groundwork for these strides is being laid now, yet much remains to be done. Chief among the upcoming challenges is establishing the theoretical foundation needed to harness the full potential of new observables in the astrophysical and cosmological domains, spanning the early Universe to the inner portions of galaxies and the stars therein. Identifying the nature of dark matter will also entail repurposing and implementing a wide range of theoretical techniques from outside the typical toolkit of astrophysics, ranging from effective field theory to the dramatically evolving world of machine learning and artificial-intelligence-based statistical inference. Through this work, the theory frontier will be at the heart of dark matter discoveries in the upcoming decade
The State-of-Play of Anomalous Microwave Emission (AME) Research
Anomalous Microwave Emission (AME) is a component of diffuse Galactic
radiation observed at frequencies in the range -60 GHz. AME was
first detected in 1996 and recognised as an additional component of emission in
1997. Since then, AME has been observed by a range of experiments and in a
variety of environments. AME is spatially correlated with far-IR thermal dust
emission but cannot be explained by synchrotron or free-free emission
mechanisms, and is far in excess of the emission contributed by thermal dust
emission with the power-law opacity consistent with the observed emission at
sub-mm wavelengths. Polarization observations have shown that AME is very
weakly polarized (%). The most natural explanation for AME is
rotational emission from ultra-small dust grains ("spinning dust"), first
postulated in 1957. Magnetic dipole radiation from thermal fluctuations in the
magnetization of magnetic grain materials may also be contributing to the AME,
particularly at higher frequencies ( GHz). AME is also an important
foreground for Cosmic Microwave Background analyses. This paper presents a
review and the current state-of-play in AME research, which was discussed in an
AME workshop held at ESTEC, The Netherlands, June 2016.Comment: Accepted for publication in New Astronomy Reviews. Summary of AME
workshop held at ESTEC, The Netherlands, June 2016, 40 pages, 18 figures.
Updated to approximately match published versio