Quantum fluctuations of Cosmological Perturbations in Generalized Gravity

Recently, we presented a unified way of analysing classical cosmological perturbation in generalized gravity theories. In this paper, we derive the perturbation spectrums generated from quantum fluctuations again in unified forms. We consider a situation where an accelerated expansion phase of the early universe is realized in a particular generic phase of the generalized gravity. We take the perturbative semiclassical approximation which treats the perturbed parts of the metric and matter fields as quantum mechanical operators. Our generic results include the conventional power-law and exponential inflations in Einstein's gravity as special cases.Comment: 5 pages, revtex, no figure

Shrinkage Confidence Procedures

The possibility of improving on the usual multivariate normal confidence was first discussed in Stein (1962). Using the ideas of shrinkage, through Bayesian and empirical Bayesian arguments, domination results, both analytic and numerical, have been obtained. Here we trace some of the developments in confidence set estimation.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/10-STS319 the Statistical Science (http://www.imstat.org/sts/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Doping and temperature-dependent optical properties of oxygen-reduced BaTiO3-d

We report on optical properties of reduced BaTiO3-d at different doping levels including insulating and metallic samples. In all the samples, including metallic one, we observe structural phase transitions from the changes in the infrared-active phonon modes. Metallic ground state is confirmed by the Drude-type lowfrequency optical reflectance. Similar to SrTiO3-d we find that the midinfrared-absorption band in BaTiO3-d appears and grows with an increase in the oxygen-vacancy concentration. Upon decrease in temperature from 300 K, the midinfrared band shifts slightly to higher frequency and evolves into two bands: the existing band and a new and smaller band at lower frequency. The appearance of the new and smaller band seems to be correlated with the structural phase transitionsComment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Minimax estimation with thresholding and its application to wavelet analysis

Many statistical practices involve choosing between a full model and reduced models where some coefficients are reduced to zero. Data were used to select a model with estimated coefficients. Is it possible to do so and still come up with an estimator always better than the traditional estimator based on the full model? The James-Stein estimator is such an estimator, having a property called minimaxity. However, the estimator considers only one reduced model, namely the origin. Hence it reduces no coefficient estimator to zero or every coefficient estimator to zero. In many applications including wavelet analysis, what should be more desirable is to reduce to zero only the estimators smaller than a threshold, called thresholding in this paper. Is it possible to construct this kind of estimators which are minimax? In this paper, we construct such minimax estimators which perform thresholding. We apply our recommended estimator to the wavelet analysis and show that it performs the best among the well-known estimators aiming simultaneously at estimation and model selection. Some of our estimators are also shown to be asymptotically optimal.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/009053604000000977 in the Annals of Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aos/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Spacetime Slices and Surfaces of Revolution

Under certain conditions, a $(1+1)$-dimensional slice $\hat{g}$ of a spherically symmetric black hole spacetime can be equivariantly embedded in $(2+1)$-dimensional Minkowski space. The embedding depends on a real parameter that corresponds physically to the surface gravity $\kappa$ of the black hole horizon. Under conditions that turn out to be closely related, a real surface that possesses rotational symmetry can be equivariantly embedded in 3-dimensional Euclidean space. The embedding does not obviously depend on a parameter. However, the Gaussian curvature is given by a simple formula: If the metric is written $g = \phi(r)^{-1} dr^2 + \phi(r) d\theta^2$, then \K_g=-{1/2}\phi''(r). This note shows that metrics $g$ and $\hat{g}$ occur in dual pairs, and that the embeddings described above are orthogonal facets of a single phenomenon. In particular, the metrics and their respective embeddings differ by a Wick rotation that preserves the ambient symmetry. Consequently, the embedding of $g$ depends on a real parameter. The ambient space is not smooth, and $\kappa$ is inversely proportional to the cone angle at the axis of rotation. Further, the Gaussian curvature of $\hat{g}$ is given by a simple formula that seems not to be widely known.Comment: 15 pages, added reference

Unified Analysis of Cosmological Perturbations in Generalized Gravity

In a class of generalized Einstein's gravity theories we derive the equations and general asymptotic solutions describing the evolution of the perturbed universe in unified forms. Our gravity theory considers general couplings between the scalar field and the scalar curvature in the Lagrangian, thus includes broad classes of generalized gravity theories resulting from recent attempts for the unification. We analyze both the scalar-type mode and the gravitational wave in analogous ways. For both modes the large scale evolutions are characterized by the same conserved quantities which are valid in the Einstein's gravity. This unified and simple treatment is possible due to our proper choice of the gauges, or equivalently gauge invariant combinations.Comment: 4 pages, revtex, no figure

Relativistic Hydrodynamic Cosmological Perturbations

Relativistic cosmological perturbation analyses can be made based on several different fundamental gauge conditions. In the pressureless limit the variables in certain gauge conditions show the correct Newtonian behaviors. Considering the general curvature ($K$) and the cosmological constant ($\Lambda$) in the background medium, the perturbed density in the comoving gauge, and the perturbed velocity and the perturbed potential in the zero-shear gauge show the same behavior as the Newtonian ones in general scales. In the first part, we elaborate these Newtonian correspondences. In the second part, using the identified gauge-invariant variables with correct Newtonian correspondences, we present the relativistic results with general pressures in the background and perturbation. We present the general super-sound-horizon scale solutions of the above mentioned variables valid for general $K$, $\Lambda$, and generally evolving equation of state. We show that, for vanishing $K$, the super-sound-horizon scale evolution is characterised by a conserved variable which is the perturbed three-space curvature in the comoving gauge. We also present equations for the multi-component hydrodynamic situation and for the rotation and gravitational wave.Comment: 16 pages, no figure, To appear in Gen. Rel. Gra

Cosmological perturbations in a gravity with quadratic order curvature couplings

We present a set of equations describing the evolution of the scalar-type cosmological perturbation in a gravity with general quadratic order curvature coupling terms. Equations are presented in a gauge ready form, thus are ready to implement various temporal gauge conditions depending on the problems. The Ricci-curvature square term leads to a fourth-order differential equation for describing the spacetime fluctuations in a spatially homogeneous and isotropic cosmological background.Comment: 5 pages, no figure, To appear in Phys. Rev.