1,460 research outputs found
Induced CMB quadrupole from pointing offsets
Recent claims in the literature have suggested that the {\it WMAP} quadrupole
is not primordial in origin, and arises from an aliasing of the much larger
dipole field because of incorrect satellite pointing. We attempt to reproduce
this result and delineate the key physics leading to the effect. We find that,
even if real, the induced quadrupole would be smaller than claimed. We discuss
reasons why the {\it WMAP} data are unlikely to suffer from this particular
systematic effect, including the implications for observations of point
sources. Given this evidence against the reality of the effect, the similarity
between the pointing-offset-induced signal and the actual quadrupole then
appears to be quite puzzling. However, we find that the effect arises from a
convolution between the gradient of the dipole field and anisotropic coverage
of the scan direction at each pixel. There is something of a directional
conspiracy here -- the dipole signal lies close to the Ecliptic Plane, and its
direction, together with the {\it WMAP} scan strategy, results in a strong
coupling to the component in Ecliptic co-ordinates. The dominant
strength of this component in the measured quadrupole suggests that one should
exercise increased caution in interpreting its estimated amplitude. The {\it
Planck} satellite has a different scan strategy which does not so directly
couple the dipole and quadrupole in this way and will soon provide an
independent measurement.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure
Constraints on cosmic hemispherical power anomalies from quasars
Recent analyses of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) maps from the WMAP
satellite have uncovered evidence for a hemispherical power anomaly, i.e. a
dipole modulation of the CMB power spectrum at large angular scales with an
amplitude of +/-14 percent. Erickcek et al have put forward an inflationary
model to explain this anomaly. Their scenario is a variation on the curvaton
scenario in which the curvaton possesses a large-scale spatial gradient that
modulates the amplitude of CMB fluctuations. We show that this scenario would
also lead to a spatial gradient in the amplitude of perturbations sigma_8, and
hence to a dipole asymmetry in any highly biased tracer of the underlying
density field. Using the high-redshift quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky
Survey, we find an upper limit on such a gradient of |nabla
sigma_8|/sigma_8<0.027/r_{lss} (99% posterior probability), where r_{lss} is
the comoving distance to the last-scattering surface. This rules out the
simplest version of the curvaton spatial gradient scenario.Comment: matches JCAP accepted version (minor revisions
Constraints from CMB in the intermediate Brans-Dicke inflation
We study an intermediate inflationary stage in a Jordan-Brans-Dicke theory.
In this scenario we analyze the quantum fluctuations corresponding to adiabatic
and isocurvature modes. Our model is compared to that described by using the
intermediate model in Einstein general relativity theory. We assess the status
of this model in light of the seven-year WMAP data.Comment: 17 pages, 6 figure
Tensors, non-Gaussianities, and the future of potential reconstruction
We present projections for reconstruction of the inflationary potential
expected from ESA's upcoming Planck Surveyor CMB mission. We focus on the
effects that tensor perturbations and the presence of non-Gaussianities have on
reconstruction efforts in the context of non-canonical inflation models. We
consider potential constraints for different combinations of
detection/null-detection of tensors and non-Gaussianities. We perform Markov
Chain Monte Carlo and flow analyses on a simulated Planck-precision data set to
obtain constraints. We find that a failure to detect non-Gaussianities
precludes a successful inversion of the primordial power spectrum, greatly
affecting uncertainties, even in the presence of a tensor detection. In the
absence of a tensor detection, while unable to determine the energy scale of
inflation, an observable level of non-Gaussianities provides correlations
between the errors of the potential parameters, suggesting that constraints
might be improved for suitable combinations of parameters. Constraints are
optimized for a positive detection of both tensors and non-Gaussianities.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures, LaTeX; V2: version submitted to JCA
Inflation might be caused by the right
We show that the scalar field that drives inflation can have a dynamical
origin, being a strongly coupled right handed neutrino condensate. The
resulting model is phenomenologically tightly constrained, and can be
experimentally (dis)probed in the near future. The mass of the right handed
neutrino obtained this way (a crucial ingredient to obtain the right light
neutrino spectrum within the see-saw mechanism in a complete three generation
framework) is related to that of the inflaton and both completely determine the
inflation features that can be tested by current and planned experiments.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure
Cosmological CPT Violation and CMB Polarization Measurements
In this paper we study the possibility of testing Charge-Parity-Time Reversal
(CPT) symmetry with cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiments. We consider
two kinds of Chern-Simons (CS) term, electromagnetic CS term and gravitational
CS term, and study their effects on the CMB polarization power spectra in
detail. By combining current CMB polarization measurements, the seven-year
WMAP, BOOMERanG 2003 and BICEP observations, we obtain a tight constraint on
the rotation angle deg (), indicating a
detection of the CPT violation. Here, we particularly take the
systematic errors of CMB measurements into account. After adding the QUaD
polarization data, the constraint becomes deg at 95%
confidence level. When comparing with the effect of electromagnetic CS term,
the gravitational CS term could only generate TB and EB power spectra with much
smaller amplitude. Therefore, the induced parameter can not be
constrained from the current polarization data. Furthermore, we study the
capabilities of future CMB measurements, Planck and CMBPol, on the constraints
of and . We find that the constraint of
can be significantly improved by a factor of 15. Therefore, if this rotation
angle effect can not be taken into account properly, the constraints of
cosmological parameters will be biased obviously. For the gravitational CS
term, the future Planck data still can not constrain very well, if
the primordial tensor perturbations are small, . We need the more
accurate CMBPol experiment to give better constraint on .Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, 4 tables, Accepted for publication in JCA
The High Redshift Integrated Sachs-Wolfe Effect
In this paper we rely on the quasar (QSO) catalog of the Sloan Digital Sky
Survey Data Release Six (SDSS DR6) of about one million photometrically
selected QSOs to compute the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe (ISW) effect at high
redshift, aiming at constraining the behavior of the expansion rate and thus
the behaviour of dark energy at those epochs. This unique sample significantly
extends previous catalogs to higher redshifts while retaining high efficiency
in the selection algorithm. We compute the auto-correlation function (ACF) of
QSO number density from which we extract the bias and the stellar
contamination. We then calculate the cross-correlation function (CCF) between
QSO number density and Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature
fluctuations in different subsamples: at high z>1.5 and low z<1.5 redshifts and
for two different choices of QSO in a conservative and in a more speculative
analysis. We find an overall evidence for a cross-correlation different from
zero at the 2.7\sigma level, while this evidence drops to 1.5\sigma at z>1.5.
We focus on the capabilities of the ISW to constrain the behaviour of the dark
energy component at high redshift both in the \LambdaCDM and Early Dark Energy
cosmologies, when the dark energy is substantially unconstrained by
observations. At present, the inclusion of the ISW data results in a poor
improvement compared to the obtained constraints from other cosmological
datasets. We study the capabilities of future high-redshift QSO survey and find
that the ISW signal can improve the constraints on the most important
cosmological parameters derived from Planck CMB data, including the high
redshift dark energy abundance, by a factor \sim 1.5.Comment: 20 pages, 18 figures, and 7 table
Constraints on the SZ Power Spectrum on Degree Angular Scales in WMAP Data
The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) effect has a distinct spectral signature that
allows its separation from fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background
(CMB) and foregrounds. Using CMB anisotropies measured in Wilkinson Microwave
Anisotropy Probe's five-year maps, we constrain the SZ fluctuations at large,
degree angular scales corresponding to multipoles in the range from 10 to 400.
We provide upper bounds on SZ fluctuations at multipoles greater than 50, and
find evidence for a hemispherically asymmetric signal at ten degrees angular
scales. The amplitude of the detected signal cannot be easily explained with
the allowed number density and temperature of electrons in the Galactic halo.
We have failed to explain the excess signal as a residual from known Galactic
foregrounds or instrumental uncertainties such as 1/f-noise.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables. Simple typos fixe
Dirac Born Infeld (DBI) Cosmic Strings
Motivated by brane physics, we consider the non-linear Dirac-Born-Infeld
(DBI) extension of the Abelian-Higgs model and study the corresponding cosmic
string configurations. The model is defined by a potential term, assumed to be
of the mexican hat form, and a DBI action for the kinetic terms. We show that
it is a continuous deformation of the Abelian-Higgs model, with a single
deformation parameter depending on a dimensionless combination of the scalar
coupling constant, the vacuum expectation value of the scalar field at
infinity, and the brane tension. By means of numerical calculations, we
investigate the profiles of the corresponding DBI-cosmic strings and prove that
they have a core which is narrower than that of Abelian-Higgs strings. We also
show that the corresponding action is smaller than in the standard case
suggesting that their formation could be favoured in brane models. Moreover we
show that the DBI-cosmic string solutions are non-pathological everywhere in
parameter space. Finally, in the limit in which the DBI model reduces to the
Bogomolnyi-Prasad-Sommerfield (BPS) Abelian-Higgs model, we find that DBI
cosmic strings are no longer BPS: rather they have positive binding energy. We
thus argue that, when they meet, two DBI strings will not bind with the
corresponding formation of a junction, and hence that a network of DBI strings
is likely to behave as a network of standard cosmic strings.Comment: 25 pages, 12 figure
Constraining the time variation of the coupling constants from cosmic microwave background: effect of \Lambda_{QCD}
We investigate constraints on the time variation of the fine structure
constant between the recombination epoch and the present epoch,
\Delta\alpha/\alpha \equiv (\alpha_{rec} - \alpha_{now})/\alpha_{now}, from
cosmic microwave background (CMB) taking into account simultaneous variation of
other physical constants, namely the electron mass m_{e} and the proton mass
m_{p}. In other words, we consider the variation of Yukawa coupling and the QCD
scale \Lambda_{QCD} in addition to the electromagnetic coupling. We clarify
which parameters can be determined from CMB temperature anisotropy in terms of
singular value decomposition. Assuming a relation among variations of coupling
constants governed by a single scalar field (the dilaton), the 95% confidence
level (C.L.) constraint on \Delta\alpha/\alpha is found to be -8.28 \times
10^{-3} < \Delta\alpha/\alpha < 1.81 \times 10^{-3}, which is tighter than the
one obtained by considering only the change of \alpha and m_{e}. We also obtain
the constraint on the time variation of the proton-to-electron mass ratio \mu
\equiv m_{p}/m_{e} to be -0.52 < \Delta\mu/\mu < 0.17 (95% C.L.) under the same
assumption. Finally, we also implement a forecast for constraints from the
PLANCK survey.Comment: 25 pages, 4 figures; references adde
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