CMB temperature bispectrum induced by cosmic strings
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN19QH (United Kingdom)
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) bispectrum of the temperature anisotropies induced by a network of cosmic strings is derived for small angular scales, under the assumption that the principal cause of temperature fluctuations is the Gott-Kaiser-Stebbins effect. We provide analytical expressions for all isosceles triangle configurations in Fourier space. Their overall amplitude is amplified as the inverse cube of the angle and diverges for flat triangles. The isosceles configurations generically lead to a negative bispectrum with a power-law decay l{sup -6} for large multipole l. However, collapsed triangles are found to be associated with a positive bispectrum whereas the squeezed triangles still exhibit negative values. We then compare our analytical estimates to a direct computation of the bispectrum from a set of 300 statistically independent temperature maps obtained from Nambu-Goto cosmic string simulations in a Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker universe. We find good agreement for the overall amplitude, the power-law behavior, and the angle dependency of the various triangle configurations. At l{approx}500 the cosmic string Gott-Kaiser-Stebbins effect contributes approximately the same equilateral CMB bispectrum amplitude as an inflationary model with |f{sub NL}{sup loc}|{approx_equal}10{sup 3}, if the strings contribute about 10% of the temperature power spectrum at l=10. Current bounds on f{sub NL} are not derived using cosmic string bispectrum templates, and so our f{sub NL} estimate cannot be used to derive bounds on strings. However it does suggest that string bispectrum templates should be included in the search of CMB non-Gaussianities.
- OSTI ID:
- 21325311
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 80, Issue 8; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.80.083501; (c) 2009 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2821
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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