arXiv subjects

Rachel Bean

Publications and source records attributed to Rachel Bean.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2011

Disentangling dark energy and cosmic tests of gravity from weak lensing systematics

We consider the impact of key astrophysical and measurement systematics on constraints on dark energy and modifications to gravity on cosmic scales. We focus on upcoming photometric "Stage III" and "Stage IV" large scale structure surveys such as DES, SuMIRe, Euclid, LSST and WFIRST. We illustrate the different redshift dependencies of gravity modifications compared to intrinsic alignments, the main astrophysical systematic. The way in which systematic uncertainties, such as galaxy bias and intrinsic alignments, are modelled can change dark energy equation of state and modified gravity figures of merit by a factor of four. The inclusion of cross-correlations of cosmic shear and galaxy position measurements helps reduce the loss of constraining power from the lensing shear surveys. When forecasts for Planck CMB and Stage IV surveys are combined, constraints on the dark energy equation of state and modified gravity model are recovered, relative to those from shear data with no systematic uncertainties, if fewer than 36 free parameters in total are used to describe the galaxy bias and intrinsic alignment models as a function of scale and redshift. To facilitate future investigations, we also provide a fitting function for the matter power spectrum arising from the phenomenological modified gravity model we consider.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2011

Wide-Field InfraRed Survey Telescope (WFIRST) Interim Report

In December 2010, NASA created a Science Definition Team (SDT) for WFIRST, the Wide Field Infra-Red Survey Telescope, recommended by the Astro 2010 Decadal Survey as the highest priority for a large space mission. The SDT was chartered to work with the WFIRST Project Office at GSFC and the Program Office at JPL to produce a Design Reference Mission (DRM) for WFIRST. This paper describes an Interim DRM. The DRM will be completed in 2012.

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arXiv2011

Universality in D-brane Inflation

We study the six-field dynamics of D3-brane inflation for a general scalar potential on the conifold, finding simple, universal behavior. We numerically evolve the equations of motion for an ensemble of more than 7 \times 10^7 realizations, drawing the coefficients in the scalar potential from statistical distributions whose detailed properties have demonstrably small effects on our results. When prolonged inflation occurs, it has a characteristic form: the D3-brane initially moves rapidly in the angular directions, spirals down to an inflection point in the potential, and settles into single-field inflation. The probability of N_{e} e-folds of inflation is a power law, P(N_{e}) \propto N_{e}^{-3}, and we derive the same exponent from a simple analytical model. The success of inflation is relatively insensitive to the initial conditions: we find attractor behavior in the angular directions, and the D3-brane can begin far above the inflection point without overshooting. In favorable regions of the parameter space, models yielding 60 e-folds of expansion arise approximately once in 10^3 trials. Realizations that are effectively single-field and give rise to a primordial spectrum of fluctuations consistent with WMAP, for which at least 120 e-folds are required, arise approximately once in 10^5 trials. The emergence of robust predictions from a six-field potential with hundreds of terms invites an analytic approach to multifield inflation.

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arXiv2011

Duality Cascade in Brane Inflation

We show that brane inflation is very sensitive to tiny sharp features in extra dimensions, including those in the potential and in the warp factor. This can show up as observational signatures in the power spectrum and/or non-Gaussianities of the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR). One general example of such sharp features is a succession of small steps in a warped throat, caused by Seiberg duality cascade using gauge/gravity duality. We study the cosmological observational consequences of these steps in brane inflation. Since the steps come in a series, the prediction of other steps and their properties can be tested by future data and analysis. It is also possible that the steps are too close to be resolved in the power spectrum, in which case they may show up only in the non-Gaussianity of the CMB temperature fluctuations and/or EE polarization. We study two cases. In the slow-roll scenario where steps appear in the inflaton potential, the sensitivity of brane inflation to the height and width of the steps is increased by several orders of magnitude comparing to that in previously studied large field models. In the IR DBI scenario where steps appear in the warp factor, we find that the glitches in the power spectrum caused by these sharp features are generally small or even unobservable, but associated distinctive non-Gaussianity can be large. Together with its large negative running of the power spectrum index, this scenario clearly illustrates how rich and different a brane inflationary scenario can be when compared to generic slow-roll inflation. Such distinctive stringy features may provide a powerful probe of superstring theory.

hep-th↗

arXiv2011

Screening bulk curvature in the presence of large brane tension

We study a flat brane solution in an effective 5D action for cascading gravity and propose a mechanism to screen extrinsic curvature in the presence of a large tension on the brane. The screening mechanism leaves the bulk Riemann-flat, thus making it simpler to generalize large extra dimension dark energy models to higher codimensions. By studying an action with cubic interactions for the brane-bending scalar mode, we find that the perturbed action suffers from ghostlike instabilities for positive tension, whereas it can be made ghost-free for sufficiently small negative tension.

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arXiv2010

Current constraints on the cosmic growth history

We present constraints on the cosmic growth history with recent cosmological data, allowing for deviations from Lambda CDM as might arise if cosmic acceleration is due to modifications to GR or inhomogeneous dark energy. We combine measures of the cosmic expansion history, from Type 1a supernovae, baryon acoustic oscillations and the CMB, with constraints on the growth of structure from recent galaxy, CMB and weak lensing surveys along with ISW-galaxy cross-correlations. Deviations from Lambda CDM are parameterized by phenomenological modifications to the Poisson equation and the relationship between the two Newtonian potentials. We find modifications that are present at the time the CMB is formed are tightly constrained through their impact on the well-measured CMB acoustic peaks. By contrast, constraints on late-time modifications to the growth history, as might arise if modifications are related to the onset of cosmic acceleration, are far weaker, but remain consistent with Lambda CDM at the 95% confidence level. For these late-time modifications we find that differences in the evolution on large and small scales could provide an interesting signature by which to search for modified growth histories with future wide angular coverage, large scale structure surveys.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2010

TASI Lectures on Cosmic Acceleration

In this series of lectures we review observational evidence for, and theoretical investigations into, cosmic acceleration and dark energy. The notes are in four sections. First I review the basic cosmological formalism to describe the expansion history of the universe and how distance measures are defined. The second section covers the evidence for cosmic acceleration from cosmic distance measurements. Section 3 discusses the theoretical avenues being considered to explain the cosmological observations and section 4 discusses how the growth of inhomogeneities and large scale structure observations might help us pin down the theoretical origin of cosmic acceleration.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2010

Cascading Cosmology

We develop a fully covariant, well-posed 5D effective action for the 6D cascading gravity brane-world model, and use this to study cosmological solutions. We obtain this effective action through the 6D decoupling limit, in which an additional scalar degree mode, π, called the brane-bending mode, determines the bulk-brane gravitational interaction. The 5D action obtained this way inherits from the sixth dimension an extra πself-interaction kinetic term. We compute appropriate boundary terms, to supplement the 5D action, and hence derive fully covariant junction conditions and the 5D Einstein field equations. Using these, we derive the cosmological evolution induced on a 3-brane moving in a static bulk. We study the strong- and weak-coupling regimes analytically in this static ansatz, and perform a complete numerical analysis of our solution. Although the cascading model can generate an accelerating solution in which the πfield comes to dominate at late times, the presence of a critical singularity prevents the πfield from dominating entirely. Our results open up the interesting possibility that a more general treatment of degravitation in a time-dependent bulk, or taking into account finite brane-thickness effects, may lead to an accelerating universe without a cosmological constant.

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arXiv2010

A weak lensing detection of a deviation from General Relativity on cosmic scales

We consider evidence for deviations from General Relativity (GR) in the growth of large scale structure, using two parameters, $γ$ and $η$, to quantify the modification. We consider the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect (ISW) in the WMAP Cosmic Microwave Background data, the cross-correlation between the ISW and galaxy distributions from 2MASS and SDSS surveys, and the weak lensing shear field from the Hubble Space Telescope's COSMOS survey along with measurements of the cosmic expansion history. We find current data, driven by the COSMOS weak lensing measurements, disfavors GR on cosmic scales, preferring $η<1$ at $1<z<2$ at the 98% significance level.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2009

Constraining Isocurvature Initial Conditions with WMAP 3-year data

We present constraints on the presence of isocurvature modes from the temperature and polarization CMB spectrum data from the WMAP satellite alone, and in combination with other datasets including SDSS galaxy survey and SNLS supernovae. We find that the inclusion of polarization data allows the WMAP data alone, as well as in combination with complementary observations, to place improved limits on the contribution of CDM and neutrino density isocurvature components individually. With general correlations, the upper limits on these sub-dominant isocurvature components are reduced to ~60% of the first year WMAP results, with specific limits depending on the type of fluctuations. If multiple isocurvature components are allowed, however, we find that the data still allow a majority of the initial power to come from isocurvature modes. As well as providing general constraints we also consider their interpretation in light of specific theoretical models like the curvaton and double inflation.

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arXiv2009

CMBPol Mission Concept Study: Probing Inflation with CMB Polarization

We summarize the utility of precise cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization measurements as probes of the physics of inflation. We focus on the prospects for using CMB measurements to differentiate various inflationary mechanisms. In particular, a detection of primordial B-mode polarization would demonstrate that inflation occurred at a very high energy scale, and that the inflaton traversed a super-Planckian distance in field space. We explain how such a detection or constraint would illuminate aspects of physics at the Planck scale. Moreover, CMB measurements can constrain the scale-dependence and non-Gaussianity of the primordial fluctuations and limit the possibility of a significant isocurvature contribution. Each such limit provides crucial information on the underlying inflationary dynamics. Finally, we quantify these considerations by presenting forecasts for the sensitivities of a future satellite experiment to the inflationary parameters.

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arXiv2008

Cosmological constraints on general, single field inflation

Inflation is now an accepted paradigm in standard cosmology, with its predictions consistent with observations of the cosmic microwave background. It lacks, however, a firm physical theory, with many possible theoretical origins beyond the simplest, canonical, slow-roll inflation, including Dirac-Born-Infeld inflation and k-inflation. We discuss how a hierarchy of Hubble flow parameters, extended to include the evolution of the inflationary sound speed, can be applied to compare a general, single field inflationary action with cosmological observational data. We show that it is important to calculate the precise scalar and tensor primordial power spectra by integrating the full flow and perturbation equations, since values of observables can deviate appreciably from those obtained using typical second-order Taylor expanded approximations in flow parameters. As part of this, we find that a commonly applied approximation for the tensor to scalar ratio, r \approx 16 c_sε, becomes poor (deviating by as much as 50%) as c_s deviates from 1 and hence the Taylor expansion including next-to-leading order contribution terms involving c_s is required. By integrating the full flow equations, we use a Monte-Carlo-Markov-Chain approach to impose constraints on the parameter space of general single field inflation, and reconstruct the properties of such an underlying theory in light of recent cosmic microwave background and large-scale structure observations.

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arXiv2008

Delayed Recombination and Standard Rulers

Measurements of Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations in galaxy surveys have been recognized as a powerful tool for constraining dark energy. However, this method relies on the knowledge of the size of the acoustic horizon at recombination derived from Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy measurements. This estimate is typically derived assuming a standard recombination scheme; additional radiation sources can delay recombination altering the cosmic ionization history and the cosmological inferences drawn from CMB and BAO data. In this paper we quantify the effect of delayed recombination on the determination of dark energy parameters from future BAO surveys such as BOSS and WFMOS. We find the impact to be small but still not negligible. In particular, if recombination is non-standard (to a level still allowed by CMB data), but this is ignored, future surveys may incorrectly suggest the presence of a redshift dependent dark energy component. On the other hand, in the case of delayed recombination, adding to the analysis one extra parameter describing deviations from standard recombination, does not significantly degrade the error-bars on dark energy parameters and yields unbiased estimates.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2008

Weighing the spatial and temporal fluctuations of the dark universe

A generic prediction of the standard cosmology, based on general relativity (GR), dark matter and the cosmological constant (and more generally, smooth dark energy), is that, the two gravitational potentials describing the spatial and temporal scalar perturbations of the universe are equivalent. Modifications in GR or dark energy clustering in general violate this relation. Thus this ratio serves as a smoking gun of the dark universe. We propose a method to extract this ratio at various cosmological scales and redshifts from a set of measurements, in a model independent way. The ratio measured by future surveys has strong discriminating power for a variety of dark universe scenarios.

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arXiv2008

Adiabatic instability in coupled dark energy-dark matter models

We consider theories in which there exists a nontrivial coupling between the dark matter sector and the sector responsible for the acceleration of the universe. Such theories can possess an adiabatic regime in which the quintessence field always sits at the minimum of its effective potential, which is set by the local dark matter density. We show that if the coupling strength is much larger than gravitational, then the adiabatic regime is always subject to an instability. The instability, which can also be thought of as a type of Jeans instability, is characterized by a negative sound speed squared of an effective coupled dark matter/dark energy fluid, and results in the exponential growth of small scale modes. We discuss the role of the instability in specific coupled CDM and Mass Varying Neutrino (MaVaN) models of dark energy, and clarify for these theories the regimes in which the instability can be evaded due to non-adiabaticity or weak coupling.

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arXiv2008

Constraining Interactions in Cosmology's Dark Sector

We consider the cosmological constraints on theories in which there exists a nontrivial coupling between the dark matter sector and the sector responsible for the acceleration of the universe, in light of the most recent supernovae, large scale structure and cosmic microwave background data. For a variety of models, we show that the strength of the coupling of dark matter to a quintessence field is constrained to be less than 7% of the coupling to gravity. We also show that long range interactions between fermionic dark matter particles mediated by a light scalar with a Yukawa coupling are constrained to be less than 5% of the strength of gravity at a distance scale of 10 Mpc. We show that all of the models we consider are quantum mechanically weakly coupled, and argue that some other models in the literature are ruled out by quantum mechanical strong coupling.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2008

Delayed Recombination and Cosmic Parameters

Current cosmological constraints from Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropies are typically derived assuming a standard recombination scheme, however additional resonance and ionizing radiation sources can delay recombination, altering the cosmic ionization history and the cosmological inferences drawn from CMB data. We show that for recent observations of CMB anisotropy, from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe satellite mission 5-year survey (WMAP5) and from the ACBAR experiment, additional resonance radiation is nearly degenerate with variations in the spectral index, n_s, and has a marked effect on uncertainties in constraints on the Hubble constant, age of the universe, curvature and the upper bound on the neutrino mass. When a modified recombination scheme is considered, the redshift of recombination is constrained to z_*=1078\pm11, with uncertainties in the measurement weaker by one order of magnitude than those obtained under the assumption of standard recombination while constraints on the shift parameter are shifted by 1-sigma to R=1.734\pm0.028. Although delayed recombination limits the precision of parameter estimation from the WMAP satellite, we demonstrate that this should not be the case for future, smaller angular scales measurements, such as those by the Planck satellite mission.

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arXiv2008

The dynamical viability of scalar-tensor gravity theories

We establish the dynamical attractor behavior in scalar-tensor theories of dark energy, providing a powerful framework to analyze classes of theories, predicting common evolutionary characteristics that can be compared against cosmological constraints. In the Jordan frame the theories are viewed as a coupling between a scalar field, Φ, and the Ricci scalar, R, F(Φ)R. The Jordan frame evolution is described in terms of dynamical variables m \equiv d\ln F/d\ln Φand r \equiv -ΦF/f, where F(Φ) = d f(Φ)/dΦ. The evolution can be alternatively viewed in the Einstein frame as a general coupling between scalar dark energy and matter, β. We present a complete, consistent picture of evolution in the Einstein and Jordan frames and consider the conditions on the form of the coupling F and βrequired to give the observed cold dark matter (CDM) dominated era that transitions into a late time accelerative phase, including transitory accelerative eras that have not previously been investigated. We find five classes of evolutionary behavior of which four are qualitatively similar to those for f(R) theories (which have β=1/2). The fifth class exists only for |β| < \sqrt{3}/4, i.e. not for f(R) theories. In models giving transitory late time acceleration, we find a viable accelerative region of the (r,m) plane accessible to scalar-tensor theories with any coupling, β(at least in the range |β| \leq 1/2, which we study in detail), and an additional region open only to theories with |β| < \sqrt{3}/4.

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