Primordial non-Gaussianity as a large-scale cosmic-web bias

Abstract

Primordial non-Gaussianity is a unique probe of the physics of inflation, but its large-scale-structure signature is difficult to measure because it appears on the largest, most cosmic-variance-limited modes. The standard view of local-type primordial non-Gaussianity is isotropic: it induces a scale-dependent correction to tracer bias, $Δb(k)\propto f_{\rm NL}k^{-2}$, on large scales. Here we show that the same large-scale response can be reformulated as an anisotropic, nonlocal environmental-bias effect. Motivated by the spectral cosmic-web hierarchy of Kitaura and Sinigaglia, we define a Hessian field $\mathcal{H}_{ij}(\bf{x})\equiv\partial_i\partial_j\nabla^{-4}δ(\bf{x})$, whose trace obeys $\mathrm{Tr}\mathcal{H}=\nabla^{-2}δ$ and therefore carries the same $k^{-2}$ enhancement that appears in the Dalal et al. scale-dependent-bias term. Diagonalizing $\mathcal{H}_{ij}$ defines four large-scale web environments, analogous to knots, filaments, sheets, and voids, although operating on scales much larger than the conventional nonlinear cosmic web. We assign one weight to each environment and test the construction with the AbacusPNG suite of local-PNG $N$-body simulations, using $f_{\rm NL}=\{-100,-30,30,100\}$. We show that these four weights reproduce the large-scale $k^{-2}$ rise of the tracer bias. We further show that existing halo catalogs without PNG can be post-processed to imprint an effective $f_{\rm NL}$ signature. Beyond mock generation, the resulting cosmic-web response motivates an observational statistic based on changes in tracer occupation of large-scale environments relative to a matched Gaussian reference, complementary to the conventional low-$k$ power spectrum.