Published April 15, 2010
| Version Published
Journal Article
Open
Translational invariance and the anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background
Abstract
Primordial quantum fluctuations produced by inflation are conventionally assumed to be statistically homogeneous, a consequence of translational invariance. In this paper we quantify the potentially observable effects of a small violation of translational invariance during inflation, as characterized by the presence of a preferred point, line, or plane.We explore the imprint such a violation would leave on the cosmic microwave background anisotropy, and provide explicit formulas for the expected amplitudes <а_(lm)а^*_(l'm')> of the spherical-harmonic coefficients.
Additional Information
© 2010 The American Physical Society. Received 27 August 2009; published 1 April 2010. This research was supported in part by the U.S. Department of Energy and by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.Attached Files
Published - Carroll2010p10047Phys_Rev_D.pdf
Files
Carroll2010p10047Phys_Rev_D.pdf
Additional details
Identifiers
- Eprint ID
- 18410
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20100524-141735641
Funding
- Department of Energy
- Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
Dates
- Created
-
2010-05-25Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
-
2021-11-08Created from EPrint's last_modified field
Caltech Custom Metadata
- Caltech groups
- Caltech Theory , Moore Center for Theoretical Cosmology and Physics , Physics Department