A set of scaling laws, based on the stochastic motions of the granular components of astronomical systems, is applied to a cosmological model with a positive cosmological constant. It follows that the mass of the dominant particle in the observable universe must be proportional to the sixth root of the cosmological constant and of the order of the nucleon mass, which is consistent with the Zeldovich scaling law. The approach is a natural way to solve the cosmic coincidence problem. On the other hand, the observed value of the cosmological constant emerges as the result of a scaling law induced by the stochastic mechanism which gives rise to the gravitationally bound systems.
Cosmic string wakes lead to a large signal in 21 cm redshift maps at redshifts larger than that corresponding to reionization. Here, we compute the angular power spectrum of 21 cm radiation as predicted by a scaling distribution of cosmic strings whose wakes have undergone shock heating.
We study cosmic Nielsen-Olesen strings in space-times with a positive cosmological constant. For the free cosmic string in a cylindrically symmetric space-time, we calculate the contribution of the cosmological constant to the angle deficit, and to the bending of null geodesics. For a cosmic string in a Schwarzschild-de Sitter space-time, we use Kruskal patches around the inner and outer horizons to show that a thin string can pierce them.
We review several cosmological backgrounds of gravitational waves accessible to direct-detection experiments, with a special emphasis on those backgrounds due to first-order phase transitions and networks of cosmic (super-)strings. For these two particular sources, we revisit in detail the computation of the gravitational wave background and improve the results of previous works in the literature. We apply our results to identify the scientific potential of the NGO/eLISA mission of ESA regarding the detectability of cosmological backgrounds.
In theories with extra dimensions, the cosmological hierarchy problem can be thought of as the unnaturally large radius of the observable universe in Kaluza-Klein units. We sketch a dynamical mechanism that relaxes this. In the early universe scenario we propose, three large spatial dimensions arise through tunneling from a 'cosmic egg', an effectively one-dimensional configuration with all spatial dimensions compact and of comparable, small size. If the string landscape is dominated by low-dimensional compactifications, cosmic eggs would be natural initial conditions for cosmology. A quantum …
We consider cosmological constraints arising from the background expansion history on the ef- fective field theory of cosmic acceleration, a theoretical framework that allows for a unified way to classify both models of dark energy and modified gravity within the linear regime. In the Einstein frame, the most general action for the background can be written in terms of a canonical scalar field which is non-minimally coupled to matter. The leading corrections to the action are expressible through a quartic kinetic term, and scalar couplings to a Gauss-Bonnet curvature term and the Einstein tens…
The dark energy scalar field is here presented as a mean-field effect arising from the collective motion of interacting structures on an expanding lattice. This cosmological analogue to solid-state soft phonons in an unstable crystal network is shown to produce cosmic acceleration while mimicking phantom equation of state. From an analysis of the Hubble diagram of type Ia supernovae, we present constraints and discussion on the parameters of the cosmic Lagrange chain, as well as on time-variation of the soft phonon equation of state.
Cosmological time crystals are created when a scalar field moves periodically through phase space in a spatially flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetime due to the presence of a limit cycle. All such cosmological time crystals in the literature suffer from gradient instabilities occurring at Null Energy Condition violating phases where the square sound speed for cosmological perturbations becomes negative. Here we present stable cosmological time crystals. Our analysis suggests this new form of scalar matter--cosmic time crystals--may be considered as a physically viable cosmological matter …
We introduce the notion of the cosmic numbers of a cosmological model, and discuss how they can be used to naturally classify models according to their ability to solve some of the problems of the standard cosmological model.
We investigate cosmological perturbations for nonlinear $f(R)$ models within the cosmic screening approach. Matter is considered both in the form of a set of discrete point-like massive bodies and in the form of a continuous pressureless perfect fluid. We perform full relativistic analysis of the first-order theory of scalar perturbations for arbitrary nonlinear $f(R)$ models and demonstrate that scalar potentials $Φ(t,\mathbf{r})$ and $Ψ(t,\mathbf{r})$ are determined by a system of only two master equations. Our equations are applicable at all spatial scales as long as the approximation $δR/\…
The early reionization (ERE) is supposed to be a physical process which happens after recombination, but before the instantaneous reionization caused by the first generation of stars. We investigate the effect of the ERE on the temperature and polarization power spectra of cosmic microwave background (CMB), and adopt principal components analysis (PCA) to model-independently reconstruct the ionization history during the ERE. In addition, we also discuss how the ERE affects the cosmological parameter estimates, and find that the ERE does not impose any significant influences on the tensor-to-sc…
We study some of the cosmological imprints of pre-inflationary particles. We show that each such particle provides a seed for a spherically symmetric cosmic defect. The profile of this cosmic defect is fixed and its magnitude is linear in a single parameter that is determined by the mass of the pre-inflationary particle. We study the CMB and peculiar velocity imprints of this cosmic defect and suggest that it could explain some of the large scale cosmological anomalies.
It is known that Vilenkin's phenomenological equation of state for static straight cosmic strings is inconsistent with Brans-Dicke theory. We will prove that, in the presence of a cosmological constant, this equation of state is consistent with Brans-Dicke theory. The general solution of the full nonlinear field equations, representing the interior of a cosmic string with a cosmological constant is also presented.
We consider two different toy cosmological models based on two fields (one normal scalar and one phantom) realizing the same evolution of the Bang-to-Rip type. One of the fields (pseudoscalar) interacts with the magnetic field breaking the conformal invariance of the latter. The effects of the amplification of cosmic magnetic fields are studied and it is shown that the presence of such effects can discriminate between different cosmological models realizing the same global evolution of the universe.
The Cosmic Defect theory has been confronted with four observational constraints: primordial nuclear species abundances emerging from the big bang nucleosynthesis; large scale structure formation in the universe; cosmic microwave background acoustic scale; luminosity distances of type Ia supernovae. The test has been based on a statistical analysis of the a posteriori probabilities for three parameters of the theory. The result has been quite satisfactory and such that the performance of the theory is not distinguishable from the one of the Lambda-CDM theory. The use of the optimal values of t…
The cosmic string theory for cosmological fluctuations is a good example of healthy scientific progress in cosmology. It is a well defined physically motivated model that has been tested by cosmological observations and has been ruled out as a primary source of primordial fluctuations. Until about fifteen years ago, the cosmic string theory of cosmological perturbations provided one of the two physically motivated candidate theories for the generation of primordial perturbations. The cosmological data that appeared during the last decade have been compared with the well defined predictions of …
We prove strong cosmic censorship for T^2-symmetric cosmological spacetimes (with spatial topology T^3 and vanishing cosmological constant Lambda) with collisionless matter. Gowdy symmetric spacetimes constitute a special case. The formulation of the conjecture is in terms of generic C^2-inextendibility of the metric. Our argument exploits a rigidity property of Cauchy horizons, inherited from Killing fields.
We investigate the line element of spacetime around a linear cosmic string in the presence of a cosmological constant. We obtain the metric and argue that it should be discarded because of asymptotic considerations. Then a time dependent and consistent form of the metric is obtained and its properties are discussed.
Galactic Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) are copious sources of gamma-rays that can pose a threat to complex life. Using recent determinations of their rate and the probability of GRBs causing massive extinction, we explore what type of universes are most likely to harbour advanced forms of life. For this purpose we use cosmological N-body simulations to determine at what time and for what value of the cosmological constant ($Λ$) the chances of life being unaffected by cosmic explosions are maximised. We find that $Λ-$dominated universes favour the survival of life against GRBs. Within a $Λ$CDM cosmol…
General Relativity provides us with an extremely powerful tool to extract at the same time astrophysical and cosmological information from the Stochastic Gravitational Wave Backgrounds (SGWBs): the cross-correlation with other cosmological tracers, since their anisotropies share a common origin and the same perturbed geodesics. In this letter we explore the cross-correlation of the cosmological and astrophysical SGWBs with Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropies, showing that future GW detectors, such as LISA or BBO, have the ability to measure such cross-correlation signals. We also pr…
We develop a model of string dynamics with back-reaction from both scaling and non-scaling loops taken into account. The evolution of a string network is described by the distribution functions of coherence segments and kinks. We derive two non-linear equations which govern the evolution of the two distributions and solve them analytically in the limit of late times. We also show that the correlation function is an exponential, and solve the dynamics for the corresponding spectrum of scaling loops.
With assumptions that the violation of the distance-duality (DD) relation entirely arises from non-conservation of the photon number and the absorption is frequency independent in the observed frequency range, we perform cosmological-model-independent tests for the cosmic opacity. The observational data include the largest Union2.1 SN Ia sample, which is taken for observed $D_\mathrm{L}$, and galaxy cluster samples compiled by De Filippis {\it et al.} and Bonamente {\it et al.}, which are responsible for providing observed $D_\mathrm{A}$. Two parameterizations, $τ(z)=2εz$ and $τ(z)=(1+z)^{2ε}-…
We study global vortices coupled to (2+1) dimensional gravity with negative cosmological constant. We found nonsingular vortex solutions in $ϕ^4$-theory with a broken U(1) symmetry, of which the spacetimes do not involve physical curvature singularity. When the magnitude of negative cosmological constant is larger than a critical value at a given symmetry breaking scale, the spacetime structure is a regular hyperbola, however it becomes a charged black hole when the magnitude of cosmological constant is less than the critical value. We explain through duality transformation the reason why stat…
This article presents the first computation of the complete bispectrum of the cosmic microwave background temperature anisotropies arising from the evolution of all cosmic fluids up to second order, including neutrinos. Gravitational couplings, electron density fluctuations and the second order Boltzmann equation are fully taken into account. Comparison to limiting cases that appeared previously in the literature are provided. These are regimes for which analytical insights can be given. The final results are expressed in terms of equivalent fNL for different configurations. It is found that f…
The intensive cosmological creation of vector W, Z- bosons in the cosmological model with the relative units is considered. Field theoretical models are studied, which predict that the CMB radiation and the baryon matter in the universe can be products of decay and annihilation processes of these primordial bosons.
We investigate the effects of cosmological expansion on the spectrum of small-scale structure on a cosmic string. We simulate the evolution of a string with two modes that differ in wavelength by one order of magnitude. Once the short mode is inside the horizon, we find that its physical amplitude remains unchanged, in spite of the fact that its comoving wavelength decreases as the longer mode enters the horizon. Thus the ratio of amplitude to wavelength for the short mode becomes larger than it would be in the absence of the long mode.
In a recent work, it has been proposed that the recent cosmic passage to a cosmic acceleration era is the result of the existence of small anti-gravity sources in each galaxy and clusters of galaxies. In particular, a swiss-cheese cosmology model which relativistically integrates the contribution of all these anti-gravity sources on galactic scale has been constructed assuming the presence of an infrared fixed point for a scale dependent cosmological constant. The derived cosmological expansion provides explanation for both the fine tuning and the coincidence problem. The present work relaxes …
It is known that the unregularized expressions for the stress-energy tensor components corresponding to subhorizon and superhorizon vacuum fluctuations of a massless scalar field in a Friedmann-Robertson-Walker background are characterized by the equation of state parameters w=1/3 and w=-1/3, which are not sufficient to produce cosmological acceleration. However, the form of the adiabatically regularized finite stress-energy tensor turns out to be completely different. By using the fact that vacuum subhorizon modes evolve nearly adiabatically and superhorizon modes have w=-1/3, we approximatel…
We propose that the origin of ultra-high energy cosmic rays beyond the GZK cutoff and the origin of small cosmological constant can both be explained by vacuum tunneling effects in a theory with degenerate vacua and fermionic doublets. By considering the possibility of tunneling from a particular winding number state, accompanied by violation of some global quantum number of fermions, the small value of the vacuum dark energy and the production of high energy cosmic rays are shown to be related. We predict that the energy of such cosmic rays should be at least $5\times 10^{14}$ GeV.
The global properties of spatially homogeneous cosmological models with collisionless matter are studied. It is shown that as long as the mean curvature of the hypersurfaces of homogeneity remains finite no singularity can occur in finite proper time as measured by observers whose worldlines are orthogonal to these hypersurfaces. Strong cosmic censorship is then proved for the Bianchi I, Bianchi IX and Kantowski-Sachs symmetry classes.
If general relativity (GR) describes the expansion of the Universe, the observed cosmic acceleration implies the existence of a `dark energy'. However, while the Universe is on average homogeneous on large scales, it is inhomogeneous on smaller scales. While GR governs the dynamics of the \emph{in}homogeneous Universe, the averaged \emph{homogeneous} Universe obeys modified Einstein equations. Can such modifications alone explain the acceleration? For a simple generic model with realistic initial conditions, we show the answer to be `no'. Averaging effects negligibly influence the cosmological…
Persistent evidence for a cosmic hemispherical asymmetry in the temperature field of cosmic microwave background (CMB) as observed by both WMAP as well as PLANCK increases the possibility of its cosmological origin. Presence of this signal may lead to different values for the standard model cosmological parameters in different directions, and that can have significant implications for other studies where they are used. We investigate the effect of this cosmic hemispherical asymmetry on cosmological parameters using non-isotropic Gaussian random simulations injected with both scale dependent an…
We investigate the effect of dark energy on the limits on the shear anisotropy in spatially homogeneous Bianchi cosmological models obtained from measurements of the temperature anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background. We shall primarily assume that the dark energy is modelled by a cosmological constant. In general, we find that there are tighter bounds on the shear than in models with no cosmological constant, although the limits are (Bianchi) model dependent. In addition, there are special spatially homogeneous cosmological models whose rate of expansion is highly anisotropic, but wh…
We report the effect of the cosmological constant and the internal energy density of a cosmic string on the deflection angle of light in the spacetime of a rotating cosmic string with internal structure. We first revisit the deflection angle by a rotating cosmic string and then provide a generalization using the geodesic equations and the Gauss-Bonnet Theorem. We show there is an agreement between the two methods when employing higher order terms of the linear mass density of the cosmic string. By modifying the integration domain for the global conical topology, we resolve the inconsistency be…
We obtain the general cosmological evolution equations for a classically consistent theory of bimetric gravity. Their analytic solutions are demonstrated to generically allow for a cosmic evolution starting out from a matter dominated FLRW universe while relaxing towards a de Sitter (anti-de Sitter) phase at late cosmic time. In particular, we examine a subclass of models which contain solutions that are able to reproduce the expansion history of the cosmic concordance model inspite of the nonlinear couplings of the two metrics. This is demonstrated explicitly by fitting these models to observ…
We investigate the cosmological and the local tests of the f(R) theory of modified gravity via the observations of (1) the cosmic expansion and (2) the cosmic structures and via (3) the solar-system experiments. To fit the possible cosmic expansion histories under consideration, for each of them we reconstruct f(R), known as "designer f(R)". We then test the designer f(R) via the cosmic-structure constraints on the metric perturbation ratio Psi/Phi and the effective gravitational coupling G_eff and via the solar-system constraints on the Brans-Dicke theory with the chameleon mechanism. We find…
In this paper, we present a scheme to investigate the opacity of the Universe in a cosmological-model-independent way, with the combination of current and future available data in gravitational wave (GW) and electromagnetic (EM) domain. In the FLRW metric, GWs propagate freely through a perfect fluid without any absorption and dissipation, which provides a distance measurement unaffected by the cosmic opacity. Focusing on the simulated data of gravitational waves from the third-generation gravitational wave detector (the Einstein Telescope, ET), as well as the newly-compiled SNe Ia data (JLA a…
We study the scaling exponents for the expanding isotropic flat cosmological models. The dimension of space, the equation of state of the cosmic fluid and the scaling exponent for a physical variable are related by the Euler Beta function that controls the singular behavior of the global integrals. We encounter dual cosmological scenarios using the properties of the Beta function. For the entropy density integral we reproduce the Fischler-Susskind holographic bound.
The third-generation ground-based gravitational-wave (GW) detector, Cosmic Explorer (CE), is scheduled to start its observation in the 2030s. In this paper, we make a forecast for cosmological parameter estimation with gravitational-wave standard siren observation from the CE. We use the simulated GW standard siren data of CE to constrain the $Λ$CDM, $w$CDM and CPL models. We combine the simulated GW data with the current cosmological electromagnetic observations including the latest cosmic microwave background anisotropies data from Planck, the optical baryon acoustic oscillation measurements…
A nontrivial topology of the spatial section of the universe is an observable, which can be probed for all locally homogeneous and isotropic universes, without any assumption on the cosmological density parameters. We discuss how one can use this observable to set constraints on the density parameters of the Universe by using a specific spatial topology along with type Ia supenovae and X-ray gas mass fraction data sets.
In this work, I develop an alternative explanation for the acceleration of the cosmic expansion, which seems to be a result of recent high redshift Supernova data. In the current interpretation, this cosmic acceleration is explained by including a positive cosmological constant term (or vacuum energy), in the standard Friedmann models. Instead, I will consider a Locally Rotationally Symmetric (LRS) and spherically symmetric (SS), but inhomogeneous spacetime, with a barotropic perfect fluid equation of state for the cosmic matter. The congruence of matter has acceleration, shear and expansion. …
In the present letter, we consider the DeBroglie-Bohm interpretation of quantum Friedmann-Robertson-Walker models in the presence of a negative cosmological constant and cosmic strings. We compute the Bohm's trajectories and quantum potentials for a quantity related to the scale factor. Then, we compare our results with the ones already in the literature, where the many worlds interpretation of the same models was used.
The stability of the cosmological event horizons found recently by Gregory [Phys. Rev. D54, 4955 (1996)] for a class of non-static global cosmic strings is studied. It is shown that they are not stable to both test particles and physical perturbations. In particular, the back reaction of the perturbations of null dust fluids will turn them into spacetime singularities. The resulted singularities are strong in the sense that the distortion of test particles diverges logarithmically when these singular hypersurfaces are approaching.
This paper is a further development of the approach to weak cosmic censorship proposed by the authors in Ref. 5. We state and prove a modified version of that work's main result under significantly relaxed assumptions on the asymptotic structure of space--time. The result, which imposes strong constraints on the occurrence of naked singularities of the strong curvature type, is in particular applicable to physically realistic cosmological models.
We illustrate the constraints that a possible detection of a non-trivial spatial topology may place on the cosmological density parameters by considering the $Λ$CDM model Poincaré dodecahedal space (PDS) topology as a circles-in-the-sky detectable topology. To this end we reanalyze the type Ia supernovae constraints on the density parameter plane $Ω_k$--$Ω_Λ$ and show that a circles-in-the-sky detectable PDS topology gives rise to important constraints on this parameters plane.
Exact solutions of the Einstein field equations with cosmic string and space varying cosmological constant, viz., $Λ= Λ(r)$, in the energy-momentum tensors are presented. Three cases have been studied: where variable cosmological constant (1) has power law dependence, (2) is proportional to the string fluid density, and (3) is purely a constant. Some cases of interesting physical consequences have been found out such that (i) variable cosmological constant can be represented by a power law of the type $Λ=3r^{-2}$, (ii) variable cosmological constant and cosmic string density are interdependent…
We discuss the relation between `bare' cosmological parameters as the true spatial average characteristics that determine the cosmological model, and the parameters interpreted by observers with a `Friedmannian bias', i.e., within a homogeneous space geometry. We may say that the latter are `dressed' by the smoothed-out geometrical inhomogeneities of the surveyed spatial region. We identify two effects that quantify the difference between `bare' and `dressed' parameters: `curvature backreaction' and `volume effect'. An estimate of the latter is given in terms of a simple geometrical example.
The existence of a scaling evolution for cosmic string loops in an expanding universe is demonstrated for the first time by means of numerical simulations. In contrast with what is usually assumed, this result does not rely on any gravitational back reaction effect and has been observed for loops as small as a few thousandths the size of the horizon. We give the energy and number densities of expected cosmic string loops in both the radiation and matter eras. Moreover, we quantify previous claims on the influence of the network initial conditions and the formation of numerically unresolved loo…
We study the evolution of the cosmic-mass-density contrast beyond the Robertson-Walker geometry including the small contribution of acceleration. We derive a second-order evolution equation for the density contrast within the spherical model for CDM collisionless fluid including the cosmological constant, the expansion and the non-vanishing vector of acceleration. While the mass-density is not seriously affected by acceleration, the mass-density contrast changes its shape at smaller redshifts even for a small amount of the acceleration parameter. This could help to resolve current controversia…
The stability of the cosmological event horizons (CEHs) of a class of non-static global cosmic strings is studied against perturbations of gravitational waves and massless scalar field. It is found that the perturbations of gravitational waves always turn the CEHs into non-scalar weak spacetime curvature singularities, while the ones of massless scalar field turn the CEHs either into non-scalar weak singularities or into scalar ones depending on the particular cases considered. The perturbations of test massless scalar field is also studied, and it is found that they do not always give the cor…
We address the issue of strong cosmic censorship for T^2-symmetric spacetimes with positive cosmological constant. In the case of collisionless matter, we complete the proof of the C^2 formulation of the conjecture for this class of spacetimes. In the vacuum case, we prove that the conjecture holds for the special cases where the area element of the group orbits does not vanish on the past boundary of the maximal Cauchy development.
We have recently constructed a manifestly local formulation of a nonlocal approach to the cosmological constant problem which can treat with quantum effects from both matter and gravitational fields. In this formulation, it has been explicitly shown that the effective cosmological constant is radiatively stable even in the presence of the gravitational loop effects. Since we are naturally led to add the $R^2$ term and the corresponding topological action to an original action, we make use of this formulation to account for the late-time acceleration of expansion of the universe in case of the …
