2006 (IPP)

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End date: 2006

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 54
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    Spectroscopy of cosmic topology
    (2006-09-07) Souradeep, Tarun
    Einstein’s theory of gravitation that governs the geometry of space-time, coupled with spectacular advance in cosmological observations, promises to deliver a ‘standard model’ of cosmology in the near future. However, local geometry of space constrains, but does not dictate the topology of the cosmos. hence, Cosmic topology has remained an enigmatic aspect of the ‘standard model’ of cosmology. Recent advance in the quantity and quality of observations has brought this issue within the realm of observational query. The breakdown of statistical homogeneity and isotropy of cosmic perturbations is a generic consequence of non trivial cosmic topology arising from to the imposed ‘crystallographic’ periodicity on the eigenstates of the Laplacian. The sky maps of Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropy and polarization most promising observations that would carry signatures of a violation of statistical isotropy and homogeneity. Hence, a measurable spectroscopy of cosmic topology is made possible using the Bipolar power spectrum (BiPS) of the temperature and polarization that quantifies violation of statistical isotropy.
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    Smoothing supernova data to reconstruct the expansion history of the universe
    (2006-01-10) Shafieloo, Arman; Alam, Ujjaini; Sahni, Varun
    We propose a non-parametric method of smoothing supernova data over redshift using a Gaussian kernel in order to reconstruct important cosmological quantities including H(z) and w(z) in a model independent manner. This method is shown to be successful in discriminating between different models of dark energy when the quality of data is commensurate with that expected from the future SuperNova Acceleration Probe (SNAP). We find that the Hubble parameter is especially well-determined and useful for this purpose. The look back time of the universe may also be determined to a very high degree of accuracy ( < ∼ 0.2%) in this method. By refining the method, it is also possible to obtain reasonable bounds on the equation of state of dark energy. We explore a new diagnostic of dark energy– the ‘w-probe’– which can be calculated from the first derivative of the data. We find that this diagnostic is reconstructed extremely accurately for different reconstruction methods even if Ω0m is marginalized over. The w-probe can be used to successfully distinguish between ΛCDM and other models of dark energy to a high degree of accuracy.
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    Statistical isotropy of CMB polarization maps
    (2006-06-25) Basak, Soumen; Hajian, Amir; Souradeep, Tarun
    We formulate statistical isotropy of CMB anisotropy maps in its most general form. We also present a fast and orientation independent statistical method to determine deviations from statistical isotropy in CMB polarization maps. Importance of having statistical tests of departures from SI for CMB polarization maps lies not only in interesting theoretical motivations but also in testing cleaned CMB polarization maps for observational artifacts such as residuals from polarized foreground emission. We propose a generalization of the Bipolar Power Spectrum (BiPS) to polarization maps. Application to the observed CMB polarization maps will be soon possible after the release of WMAP three year data. As a demonstration we show that for E-polarization this test can detect breakdown of statistical isotropy due to polarized synchrotron foreground.
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    Velocity-metallicity correlation for high-z DLA galaxies: Evidence for a mass-metallicity relation?
    (2006-06-08) Ledoux, C.; Petitjean, Patrick; Fynbo, J. P. U.; et al.
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    Universe with time dependent deceleration parameter and /\ term in general relativity
    (2006-07-28) Pradhan, Anirudh; Otarod, Saeed
    A new class of exact solutions of Einstein’s field equations with perfect fluid for an LRS Bianchi type-I spacetime is obtained by using a time dependent deceleration parameter. We have obtained a general solution of the field equations from which three models of the universe are derived: exponential, polynomial and sinusoidal form respectively. The behaviour of these models of the universe are also discussed in the frame of reference of recent supernovae Ia observations.
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    Reconstructing dark energy
    (2006-10-23) Sahni, Varun; Starobinsky, A. A.
    This review summarizes recent attempts to reconstruct the expansion history of the Uni- verse and to probe the nature of dark energy. Reconstruction methods can be broadly classified into parametric and non-parametric approaches. It is encouraging that, even with the limited observational data currently available, different approaches give consistent results for the reconstruction of the Hubble parameter H(z) and the effective equation of state w(z) of dark energy. Model independent reconstruction using current data allows for modest evolution of dark energy density with redshift. However, a cosmological constant (= dark energy with a constant energy density) remains an excellent fit to the data. Some pitfalls to be guarded against during cosmological reconstruction are summarized and future directions for the model independent reconstruction of dark energy are explored.
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    Re-analysis of the three-year wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe temperature power spectrum and likelihood
    (2006-10-02) Eriksen, H. K.; Huey, Greg; Saha, Rajib; et al.
    We analyze the three-year WMAP temperature anisotropy data seeking to confirm the power spectrum and likelihoods published by the WMAP team. We apply five independent implementations of four algorithms to the power spectrum estimation and two implementations to the parameter estimation. Our single most important result is that we broadly confirm the WMAP power spectrum and analysis. Still, we do find two small but potentially important discrepancies: On large angular scales there is a small power excess in the WMAP spectrum (5–10% at ℓ . 30) primarily due to likelihood approximation issues between 13 ≤ ℓ . 30. On small angular scales there is a systematic difference between the V- and W-band spectra (few percent at ℓ & 300). Recently, the latter discrepancy was explained by Huffenberger et al. (2006) in terms of over-subtraction of unresolved point sources. As far as the low-ℓ bias is concerned, most parameters are affected by a few tenths of a sigma. The most important effect is seen in ns. For the combination of WMAP, Acbar and BOOMERanG, the significance of ns = 1 drops from ∼ 2.7σ to ∼ 2.3σ when correcting for this bias. We propose a few simple improvements to the low-ℓ WMAP likelihood code, and introduce two important extensions to the Gibbs sampling method that allows for proper sampling of the low signal-to-noise regime. Finally, we make the products from the Gibbs sampling analysis publically available, thereby providing a fast and simple route to the exact likelihood without the need of expensive matrix inversions.
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    Strong mean field dynamos require supercritical helicity fluxes
    (2006-01-10) Brandenburg, Axel; Subramanian, Kandaswamy
    Several one and two dimensional mean field models are analyzed where the effects of current helicity fluxes and boundaries are included within the framework of the dynamical quenching model. In contrast to the case with periodic boundary conditions, the final saturation energy of the mean field decreases inversely proportional to the magnetic Reynolds number. If a nondimensional scaling factor in the current helicity flux exceeds a certain critical value, the dynamo can operate even without kinetic helicity, i.e. it is based only on shear and current helicity fluxes, as first suggested by Vishniac & Cho (2001, ApJ 550, 752). Only above this threshold is the current helicity flux also able to alleviate catastrophic quenching. The fact that certain turbulence simulations have now shown apparently non-resistively limited mean field saturation amplitudes may be suggestive of the current helicity flux having exceeded this critical value. Even below this critical value the field still reaches appreciable strength at the end of the kinematic phase, which is in qualitative agreement with dynamos in periodic domains. However, for large magnetic Reynolds numbers the field undergoes subsequent variations on a resistive time scale when, for long periods, the field can be extremely weak.
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    Static & dynamic aspects of transonicity in bondi accretion
    (2006-11-23) Ray, Arnab K.; Bhattacharjee, Jayanta K.
    Transonicity in a spherically symmetric accreting system has been considered in both the stationary and the dynamic regimes. The stationary flow, set up as a dynamical system, has been shown to be greatly unstable to even the minutest possible deviation in the boundary condition for transonicity. With the help of a simple analytical model, and some numerical modelling, it has then been argued that the flow indeed becomes transonic and stable, when the evolution of the flow is followed through time. The time-dependent approach also shows that there is a remarkable closeness between an equation of motion for a perturbation in the flow, and the metric of an analog acoustic black hole.
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