Work

Imprint of gravitational waves on the cosmic microwave background

Year: 1993

Type: article

Abstract: Long-wavelength gravitational waves can induce significant temperature anisotropy in the cosmic microwave background. Distinguishing this from anisotropy induced by energy density fluctuations is critical for testing inflationary cosmology and theories of large-scale structure formation. We describe full radiative transport calculations of the two contributions and show that they differ dramatically at angular scales below a few degrees. We show how anisotropy experiments probing large- and small-angular scales can combine to distinguish the imprint due to gravitational waves.

Source: Physical Review Letters

DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.71.324

Authors: Robert Crittenden, J. Richard Bond, Richard L. Davis, George Efstathiou, Paul J. Steinhardt

Institutions: University of Toronto, University of Oxford, Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, University of Pennsylvania

Language: English

Topic: Cosmology and Gravitation Theories

Subfield: Astronomy and Astrophysics

Field: Physics and Astronomy

Domain: Physical Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funders: U.S. Department of Energy, University of Pennsylvania, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada

OpenAlex ID: W2032606018

FWCI: 29.45

Cites: 17

Cited by: 181

Related to: 10