986 research outputs found
On the Physical Significance of Infra-red Corrections to Inflationary Observables
Inflationary observables, like the power spectrum, computed at one- and
higher-order loop level seem to be plagued by large infra-red corrections. In
this short note, we point out that these large infra-red corrections appear
only in quantities which are not directly observable. This is in agreement with
general expectations concerning infra-red effects.Comment: 11 pages; LateX file; 5 figures. Some coefficients in Eq.(A6)
corrected; References adde
General Relativistic Dynamics of Irrotational Dust: Cosmological Implications
The non--linear dynamics of cosmological perturbations of an irrotational
collisionless fluid is analyzed within General Relativity. Relativistic and
Newtonian solutions are compared, stressing the different role of boundary
conditions in the two theories. Cosmological implications of relativistic
effects, already present at second order in perturbation theory, are studied
and the dynamical role of the magnetic part of the Weyl tensor is elucidated.Comment: 12 pages , DFPD 93/A/6
Evidence for Quadratic Tidal Tensor Bias from the Halo Bispectrum
The relation between the clustering properties of luminous matter in the form
of galaxies and the underlying dark matter distribution is of fundamental
importance for the interpretation of ongoing and upcoming galaxy surveys. The
so called local bias model, where galaxy density is a function of local matter
density, is frequently discussed as a means to infer the matter power spectrum
or correlation function from the measured galaxy correlation. However,
gravitational evolution generates a term quadratic in the tidal tensor and thus
non-local in the density field, even if this term is absent in the initial
conditions (Lagrangian space). Because the term is quadratic, it contributes as
a loop correction to the power spectrum, so the standard linear bias picture
still applies on large scales, however, it contributes at leading order to the
bispectrum for which it is significant on all scales. Such a term could also be
present in Lagrangian space if halo formation were influenced by the tidal
field. We measure the corresponding coupling strengths from the
matter-matter-halo bispectrum in numerical simulations and find a non-vanishing
coefficient for the tidal tensor term. We find no scale dependence of the bias
parameters up to k=0.1 h/Mpc and that the tidal effect is increasing with halo
mass. While the Lagrangian bias picture is a better description of our results
than the Eulerian bias picture, our results suggest that there might be a tidal
tensor bias already in the initial conditions. We also find that the
coefficients of the quadratic density term deviate quite strongly from the
theoretical predictions based on the spherical collapse model and a universal
mass function. Both quadratic density and tidal tensor bias terms must be
included in the modeling of galaxy clustering of current and future surveys if
one wants to achieve the high precision cosmology promise of these datasets.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures, 1 tabl
Strip blowing from a wedge at hypersonic speeds
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/76052/1/AIAA-12372-854.pd
Primordial non-Gaussianity in the Bispectrum of the Halo Density Field
The bispectrum vanishes for linear Gaussian fields and is thus a sensitive
probe of non-linearities and non-Gaussianities in the cosmic density field.
Hence, a detection of the bispectrum in the halo density field would enable
tight constraints on non-Gaussian processes in the early Universe and allow
inference of the dynamics driving inflation. We present a tree level derivation
of the halo bispectrum arising from non-linear clustering, non-linear biasing
and primordial non-Gaussianity. A diagrammatic description is developed to
provide an intuitive understanding of the contributing terms and their
dependence on scale, shape and the non-Gaussianity parameter fNL. We compute
the terms based on a multivariate bias expansion and the peak-background split
method and show that non-Gaussian modifications to the bias parameters lead to
amplifications of the tree level bispectrum that were ignored in previous
studies. Our results are in a good agreement with published simulation
measurements of the halo bispectrum. Finally, we estimate the expected signal
to noise on fNL and show that the constraint obtainable from the bispectrum
analysis significantly exceeds the one obtainable from the power spectrum
analysis.Comment: 34 pages, 15 figures, (v3): matches JCAP published versio
Perturbations of spacetime: gauge transformations and gauge invariance at second order and beyond
We consider in detail the problem of gauge dependence that exists in
relativistic perturbation theory, going beyond the linear approximation and
treating second and higher order perturbations. We first derive some
mathematical results concerning the Taylor expansion of tensor fields under the
action of one-parameter families (not necessarily groups) of diffeomorphisms.
Second, we define gauge invariance to an arbitrary order . Finally, we give
a generating formula for the gauge transformation to an arbitrary order and
explicit rules to second and third order. This formalism can be used in any
field of applied general relativity, such as cosmological and black hole
perturbations, as well as in other spacetime theories. As a specific example,
we consider here second order perturbations in cosmology, assuming a flat
Robertson-Walker background, giving explicit second order transformations
between the synchronous and the Poisson (generalized longitudinal) gauges.Comment: slightly revised version, accepted for publication in Classical and
Quantum Gravity. 27 pages including 4 figures, latex using 2 CQG style files:
ioplppt.sty, iopl10.st
Signatures of Primordial non-Gaussianities in the Matter Power-Spectrum and Bispectrum: the Time-RG Approach
We apply the time-renormalization group approach to study the effect of
primordial non-Gaussianities in the non-linear evolution of cosmological dark
matter density perturbations. This method improves the standard perturbation
approach by solving renormalization group-like equations governing the dynamics
of gravitational instability. The primordial bispectra constructed from the
dark matter density contrast and the velocity fields represent initial
conditions for the renormalization group flow. We consider local, equilateral
and folded shapes for the initial non-Gaussianity and analyze as well the case
in which the non-linear parameter f_{NL} parametrizing the strength of the
non-Gaussianity depends on the momenta in Fourier space through a power-law
relation, the so-called running non-Gaussianity. For the local model of
non-Gaussianity we compare our findings for the power-spectrum with those of
recent N-body simulations and find that they accurately fit the N-body data up
to wave-numbers k \sim 0.25 h/Mpc at z=0. We also present predictions for the
(reduced) matter bispectra for the various shapes of non-Gaussianity.Comment: 27 pages, 12 figures. Results and discussion for a particular case
added. One figure and one reference added. Matches with the version accepted
for publication in the JCAP
Relativistic effects and primordial non-Gaussianity in the galaxy bias
When dealing with observables, one needs to generalize the bias relation
between the observed galaxy fluctuation field to the underlying matter
distribution in a gauge-invariant way. We provide such relation at second-order
in perturbation theory adopting the local Eulerian bias model and starting from
the observationally motivated uniform-redshift gauge. Our computation includes
the presence of primordial non-Gaussianity. We show that large scale-dependent
relativistic effects in the Eulerian bias arise independently from the presence
of some primordial non-Gaussianity. Furthermore, the Eulerian bias inherits
from the primordial non-Gaussianity not only a scale-dependence, but also a
modulation with the angle of observation when sources with different biases are
correlated.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX file; version accepted for publication in JCA
Flowing with Time: a New Approach to Nonlinear Cosmological Perturbations
Nonlinear effects are crucial in order to compute the cosmological matter
power spectrum to the accuracy required by future generation surveys. Here, a
new approach is presented, in which the power spectrum, the bispectrum and
higher order correlations, are obtained -- at any redshift and for any momentum
scale -- by integrating a system of differential equations. The method is
similar to the familiar BBGKY hierarchy. Truncating at the level of the
trispectrum, the solution of the equations corresponds to the summation of an
infinite class of perturbative corrections. Compared to other resummation
frameworks, the scheme discussed here is particularly suited to cosmologies
other than LambdaCDM, such as those based on modifications of gravity and those
containing massive neutrinos. As a first application, we compute the Baryonic
Acoustic Oscillation feature of the power spectrum, and compare the results
with perturbation theory, the halo model, and N-body simulations. The
density-velocity and velocity-velocity power spectra are also computed, showing
that they are much less contaminated by nonlinearities than the density-density
one. The approach can be seen as a particular formulation of the
renormalization group, in which time is the flow parameter.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figures. Matches version published on JCA
Gradient expansion(s) and dark energy
Motivated by recent claims stating that the acceleration of the present
Universe is due to fluctuations with wavelength larger than the Hubble radius,
we present a general analysis of various perturbative solutions of fully
inhomogeneous Einstein equations supplemented by a perfect fluid. The
equivalence of formally different gradient expansions is demonstrated. If the
barotropic index vanishes, the deceleration parameter is always positive
semi-definite.Comment: 17 pages, no figure
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