arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Yuan-Zhong Zhang.
We review potential low-frequency gravitational-wave sources, which are expected to be detected by Taiji, a Chinese space-based gravitational-wave detector, estimate the detection rates of these gravitational-wave sources and present the parameter estimation of massive black hole binaries.
We use both mass and internal energy specified rubidium atoms to jointly test the weak equivalence principle (WEP). We improve the four-wave double-diffraction Raman transition method (FWDR) we proposed before to select atoms with certain mass and angular momentum state, and perform dual-species atom interferometer. By combining $^{87}$Rb and $^{85}$Rb atoms with different angular momenta, we compare the differential gravitational acceleration of them, and determine the value of Eötvös parameter, $η$, which measures the strength of the violation of WEP. For one case ($^{87}$Rb$|\emph{F}=1\rangle$ - $^{85}$Rb$|\emph{F}=2\rangle$),the statistical uncertainty of $η$ is $1.8 \times 10^{-10}$ at integration time of 8960 s. With various systematic errors correction, the final value is $η=(-4.4 \pm 6.7) \times 10^{-10}$. Comparing with the previous WEP test experiments using atoms, this work gives a new upper limit of WEP violation for $^{87}$Rb and $^{85}$Rb atom pairs.
We investigate constraints on Lorentz invariance violation in the neutrino sector from a joint analysis of big bang nucleosynthesis and the cosmic microwave background. The effect of Lorentz invariance violation during the epoch of big bang nucleosynthesis changes the predicted helium-4 abundance, which influences the power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background at the recombination epoch. In combination with the latest measurement of the primordial helium-4 abundance, the Planck 2015 data of the cosmic microwave background anisotropies give a strong constraint on the deformation parameter since adding the primordial helium measurement breaks the degeneracy between the deformation parameter and the physical dark matter density.
We derive the Boltzmann equation in the synchronous gauge for massive neutrinos with a deformed dispersion relation. Combining the 7-year WMAP data with lower-redshift measurements of the expansion rate, we give constraints on the deformation parameter and find that the deformation parameter is strong degenerate with the physical dark matter density instead of the neutrino mass. Our results show that there is no evidence for Lorentz invariant violation in the neutrino sector. The ongoing Planck experiment could provide improved constraints on the deformation parameter.
We reconstruct the shape of the primordial power spectrum of curvature perturbations in extended cosmological models, including addition of massive neutrinos, extra relativistic species or varying primordial helium abundance, from the latest cosmic microwave background data from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, the Atacama Cosmology Telescope and the South Pole Telescope. We find that a scale-invariant primordial spectrum is disfavored by the data at 95% confidence level even in the presence of massive neutrinos, however it can lie within the 95% confidence region if the effective number of relativistic species or the primordial helium abundance is allowed to vary freely. The constraints on the extension parameters from WMAP7+ACT+H0+BAO, are the total mass of neutrinos sum(m_nu) < 0.48 eV (95% CL), the effective number of relativistic species N_eff = 4.50 +/- 0.81 and the primordial helium abundance Y_p = 0.303 +/- 0.075. The constraints from WMAP7+SPT+H0+BAO, are sum(m_nu) < 0.45 eV (95% CL), N_eff = 3.86 +/- 0.63 and Y_p = 0.277 +/- 0.050.
We use the localized principle component analysis to detect deviations from scale invariance of the primordial power spectrum of curvature perturbations. With the technique we make uncorrelated estimates of the primordial power spectrum with five wavenumber bins. In the framework of a minimal LCDM model, using the latest cosmic microwave background data from the WMAP and ACT experiments we find that more than 95% of the preferred models are incompatible with the assumption of scale-invariance, but still compatible with a power-law primordial spectrum. We also forecast the sensitivity and constraints achievable by the Planck experiment by performing Monte Carlo studies on simulated data. Planck could significantly improve the constraints on the primordial power spectrum, especially at small scales by roughly a factor of 4.
Measuring the deviation from scale invariance of the primordial power spectrum is a critical test of inflation. In this paper we reconstruct the shape of the primordial power spectrum of curvature perturbations from the cosmic microwave background data, including the 7-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe data and the Atacama Cosmology Telescope 148 GHz data, by using a binning method of a cubic spline interpolation in log-log space. We find that the power-law spectrum is preferred by the data and that the Harrison-Zel'dovich spectrum is disfavored at 95% confidence level. These conclusions hold with and without allowing for tensor modes, however the simpler model without tensors is preferred by the data. We do not find evidence for a feature in the primordial power spectrum - in full agreement with generic predictions from cosmological inflation.
Determining the energy scale of inflation is crucial to understand the nature of inflation in the early Universe. We place observational constraints on the energy scale of the observable part of the inflaton potential by combining the 7-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe data with distance measurements from the baryon acoustic oscillations in the distribution of galaxies and the Hubble constant measurement. Our analysis provides an upper limit on this energy scale, 2.3 \times 10^{16} GeV at 95% confidence level. Moreover, we forecast the sensitivity and constraints achievable by the Planck experiment by performing Monte Carlo studies on simulated data. Planck could significantly improve the constraints on the energy scale of inflation and on the shape of the inflaton potential.
We construct exact nonstatic nonhomogeneous spherically symmetric solutions in the theory of gravity with a scalar field possessing the exponential potential. The solution of particular interest corresponds to the scalar field with negative kinetic energy, i.e. a ghost, and represents two asymptotically homogeneous spatially flat universes connected by a throat. We interpret this solution as a wormhole in cosmological setting. Both the universes and the wormhole throat are simultaneously expanding with acceleration. The character of expansion qualitatively depends on the wormhole's mass $m$. For $m=0$ the expansion goes exponentially, so that the corresponding spacetime configuration represents two de Sitter universes joining by the throat. For $m>0$ the expansion has the power character, so that one has the inflating wormhole connecting two homogeneous spatially flat universes expanding according to the power law into the final singularity. The stability analysis of the non-static wormholes reveals their instability against linear spherically symmetric perturbations.
We consider the possibility of observing the onset of the late time inflation of our patch of the Universe. The Hubble size criterion and the event horizon criterion are applied to several dark energy models to discuss the problem of future inflation of the Universe. We find that the acceleration has not lasted long enough to confirm the onset of inflation by present observations for the dark energy model with constant equation of state, the holographic dark energy model and the generalized Chaplygin gas (GCG) model. For the flat $Λ$CDM model with $Ω_{m0}=0.3$, we find that if we use the Hubble size criterion, we need to wait until the $a_v$ which is the scale factor at the time when the onset of inflation is observed reaches 3.59 times of the scale factor $a_T$ when the Universe started acceleration, and we need to wait until $a_v=2.3 a_T$ to see the onset of inflation if we use the event horizon criterion. For the flat holographic dark energy model with $d=1$, we find that $a_v=3.46 a_T$ with the Hubble horizon and $a_v=2.34 a_T$ with the event horizon, respectively. For the flat GCG model with the best supernova fitting parameter $α=1.2$, we find that $a_v=5.50 a_T$ with the Hubble horizon and $a_v=2.08 a_T$ with the event horizon, respectively.
The energy conditions give upper bounds on the luminosity distance. We apply these upper bounds to the 192 essence supernova Ia data to show that the Universe had experienced accelerated expansion. This conclusion is drawn directly from the distance modulus-reshift graph. In addition to be a very simple method, this method is also totally independent of any cosmological model. From the degeneracy of the distance modulus at low redshift, we argue that the choice of $w_0$ for probing the property of dark energy is misleading. One explicit example is used to support this argument.
We develop a theoretical method of constructing the scalar (quintessence or phantom) potential directly from the dimensionless dark energy function X(z), the dark energy density in units of its present value. We apply our method to two parametrizations of the dark energy density, the quiessence-Lambda ansatz and the generalized Chaplygin gas model, and discuss some features of the constructed potentials.
We consider a new generalized Chaplygin gas model that includes the original Chaplygin gas model as a special case. In such a model the generalized Chaplygin gas evolves as from dust to quiessence or phantom. We show that the background evolution for the model is equivalent to that for a coupled dark energy model with dark matter. The constraints from the current type Ia supernova data favour a phantom-like Chaplygin gas model.
The w-w' plane, defined by the equation of state parameter for the dark energy and its derivative with respect to the logarithm of the scale factor, is useful to the study of classifying the dynamical dark energy models. In this note, we examine the evolving behavior of the two-field quintom models with w crossing the w=-1 barrier in the w-w' plane. We find that these models can be divided into two categories, type A quintom in which w changes from >-1 to <-1 and type B quintom in which w changes from <-1 to >-1 as the universe expands.
The primordial perturbations of test scalar fields not affecting the evolution of background may be very interesting since they can be transferred to the curvature perturbations by some mechanisms, and thus under certain condition can be responsible for the structure formation of observable universe. In this brief report we study the primordial perturbations of test scalar fields in various (super)accelerated expanding backgrounds.
Gravitational lensing by traversable Lorentzian wormholes is a ew possibility which is analyzed here in the strong field limit. Wormhole solutions are considered in the Einstein minimally coupled theory and in the brane world model. The observables in both the theories show significant differences from those arising in the Schwarzschild black hole lensing. As a corollary, it follows that wormholes with zero Keplerian mass exhibit lensing properties which are qualitatively (though not quantitatively) the same as those of a Schwarzschild black hole. Some special features of the considered solutions are pointed out.
We show that in a multi DD branes system with high temperature, there may exist a thermal cosmological phase before usual tachyon inflation. Though this thermal phase can be very transitory, it may has some interesting applications for early tachyon/brane cosmology.
The present article lies at the interface between gravity, a highly nonlinear phenomenon, and quantum field theory. The nonlinear field equations of Einstein permit the theoretical existence of classical wormholes. One of the fundamental questions relates to the practical viability of such wormholes. One way to answer this question is to assess if the total \emph{volume} of exotic matter needed to maintain the wormhole is finite. Using this value as the lower bound, we propose a modified semiclassical volume Averaged Null Energy Condition (ANEC) constraint as a method of discarding many solutions as being possible self-consistent wormhole solutions of semiclassical gravity. The proposed constraint is consistent with known results. It turns out that a class of Morris-Thorne wormholes can be ruled out on the basis of this constraint.