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arXiv · 1611.10350

Robust predictions for an oscillatory bispectrum in Planck 2015 data from transient reductions in the speed of sound of the inflaton

Jesus Torrado·Bin Hu·Ana Achucarro
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Abstract

We update the search for features in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) power spectrum due to transient reductions in the speed of sound, using Planck 2015 CMB temperature and polarisation data. We enlarge the parameter space to much higher oscillatory frequencies of the feature, and define a robust prior independent of the ansatz for the reduction, guaranteed to reproduce the assumptions of the theoretical model and exhaustive in the regime in which the feature is easily distinguishable from the baseline cosmology. We find a fit to the $\ell\approx20$--$40$ minus/plus structure in Planck TT power spectrum, as well as features spanning along the higher $\ell$'s ($\ell\approx100$--$1500$). For the last ones, we compute the correlated features that we expect to find in the CMB bispectrum, and asses their signal-to-noise and correlation to the ISW-lensing secondary bispectrum. We compare our findings to the shape-agnostic oscillatory template tested in Planck 2015, and we comment on some tantalising coincidences with some of the traits described in Planck's 2015 bispectrum data.

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Jesus Torrado, Bin Hu, Ana Achucarro. 2017-10-12. Robust predictions for an oscillatory bispectrum in Planck 2015 data from transient reductions in the speed of sound of the inflaton. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.96.083515

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