558 research outputs found
On the statistics of proto-cluster candidates detected in the Planck all-sky survey
Observational investigations of the abundance of massive precursors of local
galaxy clusters ("proto-clusters") allow us to test the growth of density
perturbations, to constrain cosmological parameters that control it, to test
the theory of non-linear collapse and how the galaxy formation takes place in
dense environments. The Planck collaboration has recently published a catalogue
of >~ 2000 cold extra-galactic sub-millimeter sources, i.e. with colours
indicative of z >~ 2, almost all of which appear to be over-densities of
star-forming galaxies. They are thus considered as proto-cluster candidates.
Their number densities (or their flux densities) are far in excess of
expectations from the standard scenario for the evolution of large-scale
structure. Simulations based on a physically motivated galaxy evolution model
show that essentially all cold peaks brighter than S_545GHz = 500 mJy found
in Planck maps after having removed the Galactic dust emission can be
interpreted as positive Poisson fluctuations of the number of high-z dusty
proto-clusters within the same Planck beam, rather then being individual clumps
of physically bound galaxies. This conclusion does not change if an empirical
fit to the luminosity function of dusty galaxies is used instead of the
physical model. The simulations accurately reproduce the statistic of the
Planck detections and yield distributions of sizes and ellipticities in
qualitative agreement with observations. The redshift distribution of the
brightest proto-clusters contributing to the cold peaks has a broad maximum at
1.5 <~ z <~ 3. Therefore follow-up of Planck proto-cluster candidates will
provide key information on the high-z evolution of large scale structure
Reconstructing the primordial power spectrum from the CMB
We propose a straightforward and model independent methodology for
characterizing the sensitivity of CMB and other experiments to wiggles,
irregularities, and features in the primordial power spectrum. Assuming that
the primordial cosmological perturbations are adiabatic, we present a function
space generalization of the usual Fisher matrix formalism, applied to a CMB
experiment resembling Planck with and without ancillary data. This work is
closely related to other work on recovering the inflationary potential and
exploring specific models of non-minimal, or perhaps baroque, primordial power
spectra. The approach adopted here, however, most directly expresses what the
data is really telling us. We explore in detail the structure of the available
information and quantify exactly what features can be reconstructed and at what
statistical significance.Comment: 43 pages Revtex, 23 figure
Maximum Path Information and Fokker-Planck Equation
We present in this paper a rigorous method to derive the nonlinear
Fokker-Planck (FP) equation of anomalous diffusion directly from a
generalization of the principle of least action of Maupertuis proposed by Wang
for smooth or quasi-smooth irregular dynamics evolving in Markovian process.
The FP equation obtained may take two different but equivalent forms. It was
also found that the diffusion constant may depend on both q (the index of
Tsallis entropy) and the time t.Comment: 7 page
Pre - Inflationary Clues from String Theory ?
"Brane supersymmetry breaking" occurs in String Theory when the only
available combinations of D-branes and orientifolds are not mutually BPS and
yet do not introduce tree-level tachyon instabilities. It is characterized by
the emergence of a steep exponential potential, and thus by the absence of
maximally symmetric vacua. The corresponding low-energy supergravity admits
intriguing spatially-flat cosmological solutions where a scalar field is forced
to climb up toward the steep potential after an initial singularity, and
additional milder terms can inject an inflationary phase during the ensuing
descent. We show that, in the resulting power spectra of scalar perturbations,
an infrared suppression is typically followed by a pre-inflationary peak that
reflects the end of the climbing phase and can lie well apart from the
approximately scale invariant profile. A first look at WMAP9 raw data shows
that, while the chi^2 fits for the low-l CMB angular power spectrum are clearly
compatible with an almost scale invariant behavior, they display nonetheless an
eye-catching preference for this type of setting within a perturbative string
regime.Comment: 34 pages, LaTeX, 16 eps figures. Relative displacement in fig. 14 and
some typos corrected, references and acknowledgments updated. To appear in
JCA
Note on a new fundamental length scale instead of the Newtonian constant
The newly proposed entropic gravity suggests gravity as an emergent force
rather than a fundamental one. In this approach, the Newtonian constant
does not play a fundamental role any more, and a new fundamental constant is
required to replace its position. This request also arises from some
philosophical considerations to contemplate the physical foundations for the
unification of theories. We here consider the suggestion to derive from
more fundamental quantities in the presence of a new fundamental length scale
, which is suspected to originate from the structure of quantum space-time,
and can be measured directly from Lorentz-violating observations. Our results
are relevant to the fundamental understanding of physics, and more practically,
of natural units, as well as explanations of experimental constraints in
searching for Lorentz violation.Comment: 10 latex pages, final version for journal publicatio
Universal restrictions to the conversion of heat into work derived from the analysis of the Nernst theorem as a uniform limit
We revisit the relationship between the Nernst theorem and the Kelvin-Planck
statement of the second law. We propose that the exchange of entropy uniformly
vanishes as the temperature goes to zero. The analysis of this assumption shows
that is equivalent to the fact that the compensation of a Carnot engine scales
with the absorbed heat so that the Nernst theorem should be embedded in the
statement of the second law.
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Se analiza la relaci{\'o}n entre el teorema de Nernst y el enunciado de
Kelvin-Planck del segundo principio de la termodin{\'a}mica. Se{\~n}alamos el
hecho de que el cambio de entrop{\'\i}a tiende uniformemente a cero cuando la
temperatura tiende a cero. El an{\'a}lisis de esta hip{\'o}tesis muestra que es
equivalente al hecho de que la compensaci{\'o}n de una m{\'a}quina de Carnot
escala con el calor absorbido del foco caliente, de forma que el teorema de
Nernst puede derivarse del enunciado del segundo principio.Comment: 8pp, 4 ff. Original in english. Also available translation into
spanish. Twocolumn format. RevTe
Planck 2013 results. VI. High Frequency Instrument data processing
We describe the processing of the 531 billion raw data samples from the High Frequency Instrument (hereafter HFI), which we performed to produce six temperature maps from the first 473 days of Planck-HFI survey data. These maps provide an accurate rendition of the sky emission at 100, 143, 217, 353, 545, and 857 GHz with an angular resolution ranging from 9.7 to 4.6 arcmin. The detector noise per (effective) beam solid angle is respectively, 10, 6, 12 and 39 microKelvin in HFI four lowest frequency channel (100--353 GHz) and 13 and 14 kJy/sr for the 545 and 857 GHz channels. Using the 143 GHz channel as a reference, these two high frequency channels are intercalibrated within 5% and the 353 GHz relative calibration is at the percent level. The 100 and 217 GHz channels, which together with the 143 GHz channel determine the high-multipole part of the CMB power spectrum (50 < l <2500), are intercalibrated at better than 0.2 %
Measuring neutrino masses with a future galaxy survey
We perform a detailed forecast on how well a Euclid-like photometric galaxy
and cosmic shear survey will be able to constrain the absolute neutrino mass
scale. Adopting conservative assumptions about the survey specifications and
assuming complete ignorance of the galaxy bias, we estimate that the minimum
mass sum of sum m_nu ~ 0.06 eV in the normal hierarchy can be detected at 1.5
sigma to 2.5 sigma significance, depending on the model complexity, using a
combination of galaxy and cosmic shear power spectrum measurements in
conjunction with CMB temperature and polarisation observations from Planck.
With better knowledge of the galaxy bias, the significance of the detection
could potentially reach 5.4 sigma. Interestingly, neither Planck+shear nor
Planck+galaxy alone can achieve this level of sensitivity; it is the combined
effect of galaxy and cosmic shear power spectrum measurements that breaks the
persistent degeneracies between the neutrino mass, the physical matter density,
and the Hubble parameter. Notwithstanding this remarkable sensitivity to sum
m_nu, Euclid-like shear and galaxy data will not be sensitive to the exact mass
spectrum of the neutrino sector; no significant bias (< 1 sigma) in the
parameter estimation is induced by fitting inaccurate models of the neutrino
mass splittings to the mock data, nor does the goodness-of-fit of these models
suffer any significant degradation relative to the true one (Delta chi_eff ^2<
1).Comment: v1: 29 pages, 10 figures. v2: 33 pages, 12 figures; added sections on
shape evolution and constraints in more complex models, accepted for
publication in JCA
Detection of relic gravitational waves in the CMB: Prospects for CMBPol mission
Detection of relic gravitational waves, through their imprint in the cosmic
microwave background radiation, is one of the most important tasks for the
planned CMBPol mission. In the simplest viable theoretical models the
gravitational wave background is characterized by two parameters, the
tensor-to-scalar ratio and the tensor spectral index . In this paper,
we analyze the potential joint constraints on these two parameters, and
, using the potential observations of the CMBPol mission, which is
expected to detect the relic gravitational waves if . The
influence of the contaminations, including cosmic weak lensing, various
foreground emissions, and systematical errors, is discussed.Comment: 26 pages, 19 figures, 4 tables; JCAP in pres
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