Table of contents

Dark matter that interacts strongly with baryons can avoid the stringent dark matter direct detection constraints, because, like baryons, they are likely to be absorbed when traversing the rocks, leading to a suppressed flux in deep underground labs. Such strongly interacting dark matter, however, can be probed by dark matter experiments or other experiments operated on the ground level or in the atmosphere. In this paper we carry out systematic analysis of two of these experiments, XQC and CSR, to compute the experimental constraints on the strongly interacting dark matter in the following three scenarios: (1) spin-independent and spin-dependent interactions; (2) different velocity dependent cross sections; (3) different dark matter mass fractions. Some of the scenarios are first analyzed in the literature. We find that the XQC exclusion region has some non-trivial dependencies on the various parameters and the limits in the spin-dependent case is quite different from the spin-independent case. A peculiar region in the parameter space, where the XQC constraint disappears, is also found in our Monte Carlo simulations. This occurs in the case where the interaction cross section is proportional to the square of the velocity. We further compare our XQC and CSR limits to other experimental constraints, and find that a large parameter space is allowed by various experiments if the dark matter mass fraction is sufficiently small, f_χ ≲ 10^-4.

The Einstein-Æther theory has drawn a lot of attentions in recent years. As a representative case of gravitational theories that break the Lorentz symmetry, it plays an important role in testing the Lorentz-violating effects and shedding light on the attempts to construct quantum gravity. Since the first detection to the gravitational wave, the event GW150914, a brand new window has been opened to testing the theory of gravity with gravitational wave observations. At the same time, the study of gravitational waves itself also provides us a serendipity of accessing the nature of a theory. In this paper, we focus on the odd-parity gravitational perturbations to a background that describes a wormhole-like geometry under the Einstein-Æther theory. Taking advantage of this set of analytic background solutions, we are able to simplify the Lagrangian and construct a set of coupled single-parameter dependent master equations, from which we solve for the quasi-normal modes that carry the physical information of the emitted gravitational waves. Basically, the results reflect a consistency between Einstein-Æther theory and general relativity. More importantly, as long as the no-ghost condition and the latest observational constraints are concerned, we notice that the resultant quasi-normal mode solutions intimate a kind of dynamical instability. Thus, the solutions are ruled out based on their stability against small linear perturbations.

Primordial black holes (PBHs) are black holes that might have formed in high density regions in the early universe. The presence of local-type non-Gaussianity can lead to large-scale fluctuations in the PBH formation rate. If PBHs make up a non-negligible fraction of dark matter, these fluctuations can appear as isocurvature modes, and be used to constrain the amplitude of non-Gaussianity. Assuming that the parameters of non-Gaussianity are constant over all scales, we build upon the results of previous work by extending the calculation to include peaks theory and making use of the compaction C for the formation criteria, accounting for non-linearities between C and the curvature perturbation ζ. For quadratic models of non-Gaussianity, our updated calculation gives constraints that are largely unaltered compared to those previously found, while for cubic models the constraints worsen significantly. In case all of the DM is made up of PBHs, the parameters of non-Gaussianity are -2.9 · 10^-4 < f < 3.8 · 10^-4 and -1.5 · 10^-3 < g < 1.9 · 10^-3 for quadratic and cubic models respectively.

The flux of high energy neutrinos and photons produced in a blazar could get attenuated when they propagate through the dark matter spike around the central black hole and the halo of the host galaxy. Using the observation by IceCube of a few high-energy neutrino events from TXS 0506+056, and their coincident gamma ray events, we obtain new constraints on the dark matter-neutrino and dark matter-photon scattering cross sections. Our constraints are orders of magnitude more stringent than those derived from considering the attenuation through the intergalactic medium and the Milky Way dark matter halo. When the cross-section increases with energy, our constraints are also stronger than those derived from the CMB and large-scale structure.

Cosmic gravitons are expected in the MHz–GHz regions that are currently unreachable by the operating wide-band interferometers and where various classes of electromechanical detectors have been proposed through the years. The minimal chirp amplitude detectable by these instruments is often set on the basis of the sensitivities reachable by the detectors currently operating in the audio band. By combining the observations of the pulsar timing arrays, the limits from wide-band detectors and the other phenomenological bounds we show that this requirement is far too generous and even misleading since the actual detection of relic gravitons well above the kHz would demand chirp and spectral amplitudes that are ten or even fifteen orders of magnitude smaller than the ones currently achievable in the audio band, for the same classes of stochastic sources. We then examine more closely the potential high-frequency signals and show that the sensitivity in the chirp and spectral amplitudes must be even smaller than the ones suggested by the direct and indirect constraints on the cosmic gravitons. We finally analyze the high-frequency detectors in the framework of Hanbury-Brown Twiss interferometry and argue that they are actually more essential than the ones operating in the audio band (i.e. between few Hz and few kHz) if we want to investigate the quantumness of the relic gravitons and their associated second-order correlation effects. We suggest, in particular, how the statistical properties of thermal and non-thermal gravitons can be distinguished by studying the corresponding second-order interference effects.

We consider the extension of the Standard Model (SM) with scalar leptoquarks in SU(2) singlet, doublet and triplet representations. Through the coupling between leptoquark and the SM Higgs field, the electroweak phase transition (EWPT) can turn into first-order and consequently produce gravitational wave signals. We compute the required value of the leptoquark-Higgs for first-order EWPT to happen and discuss about the possible constraint from Higgs phenomenology. Choosing some benchmarks, we present the strength of the gravitational waves produced during the leptoquark-induced first-order EWPT and compare them to detector sensitivities. We find that the SU(2) representations of the leptoquark can be distinguished by gravitational waves in the parameter space where first-order EWPT can happen as a function of the Higgs portal coupling.

The Hawking evaporation process, leading to the production of detectable particle species, constrains the abundance of light black holes, presumably of primordial origin. Here, we reconsider and correct constraints from soft gamma-ray observations, including of the gamma-ray line, at 511 keV, produced by electron-positron pair-annihilation, where positrons originate from black hole evaporation. First, we point out that the INTEGRAL detection of the Large Magellanic Cloud provides one of the strongest bounds attainable with present observations; and that future MeV gamma-ray telescopes, such as GECCO, will greatly enhance such constraints. Second, we discuss issues with previous limits from the isotropic flux at 511 keV and we provide updated, robust constraints from recent measurements of the diffuse Galactic soft gamma-ray emission and from the isotropic soft gamma-ray background.

The recent observation of ⁴He favors a large lepton asymmetry at the big bang nucleosynthesis. If Q-balls with a lepton charge decay after the electroweak phase transition, such a large lepton asymmetry can be generated without producing too large baryon asymmetry. In this scenario, Q-balls dominate the universe before the decay and induces the sharp transition from the early matter-dominated era to the radiation-dominated era. In this transition, the gravitational waves (GWs) are enhanced through a second-order effect of the scalar perturbations. We evaluate the density of the produced GWs and show that pulsar timing array observations can probe this scenario depending on the amplitude of the scalar perturbations.

Dark gauge fields have been discussed as candidates for dark matter recently. If they existed, primordial dark magnetic fields during inflation would have existed. It is believed that primordial gravitational waves (PGWs) arise out of quantum fluctuations during inflation. We study the graviton-dark photon conversion process in the presence of background primordial dark magnetic fields and find that the process induces the tachyonic instability of the PGWs. As a consequence, a peak appears in the power spectrum of PGWs. It turns out that the peak height depends on the direction of observation. The peak frequency could be in the range from 10^-5 to 10³ Hertz for GUT scale inflation. Hence, the observation of PGWs could provide a new window for probing primordial dark magnetic fields.

We discuss the possibility of unifying dark matter physics and inflation in the Z₅  model of the two-component dark matter. Inflation driven by the two-component dark matter fields can be divided into two cases, singlet dark matter inflation and mixed dark matter inflation, where both two-component play the role of inflaton in the latter case. For dark matter, we focus on the mixed dark matter inflation case. We show a viable parameter space that satisfies the theoretical and dark matter relic density constraint in the case of successful inflation. It turns out that the dark matter density is dominated by the light component, which is consistent with the feature of the Z₅ model of the two-component dark matter.

The effects of a scalar field, known as the "assistant field," which nonminimally couples to gravity, on single-field inflationary models are studied. The analysis provides analytical expressions for inflationary observables such as the spectral index (n_s), the tensor-to-scalar ratio (r), and the local-type nonlinearity parameter (f_NL^(local)). The presence of the assistant field leads to a lowering of n_s and r in most of the parameter space, compared to the original predictions. In some cases, n_s may increase due to the assistant field. This revives compatibility between ruled-out single-field models and the latest observations by Planck-BICEP/Keck. The results are demonstrated using three example models: loop inflation, power-law inflation, and hybrid inflation.

We study the cosmological inflation and dark matter (DM) in a unified way within a ₃ complex scalar model. The real and imaginary parts of the complex scalar act as the inflaton and DM respectively. The slow-rolling inflation with non-minimal coupling in both the metric and Palatini formalisms can be realized. We examine the whole parameters space by fully considering the theoretical and experimental constraints. We find that in the low-energy scale, the DM relic density and the DM-nucleon direct scattering experiments favor the mixing angle |θ| ≲ 0.25, the DM mass m_χ ≳ 80 GeV, and the mass of Higgs-like scalar m_h2 ≳ 300 GeV. In the high-energy scale, after further considering the cosmological constraints of the scalar spectral index and the tensor-to-scalar ratio for the two forms of inflation, the scalar spectral indices are both ∼ 0.965, the non-minimum coupling coefficients are ∼ 10⁴ and ∼ 10⁹, and the tensor-to-scalar ratios are ∼ 10^-3 and ≲ 10^-11 respectively, which suggests that the inflation under the two formalisms can be distinguished by measuring the tensor-to-scalar ratio with higher precision.

We discuss production of QCD axion dark matter in a novel scenario, which assumes time-varying scale of Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking. The latter decreases as the Universe's temperature at early times and eventually stabilises at a large constant value. Such behavior is caused by the portal interaction between the complex field carrying Peccei-Quinn charge and a Higgs-like scalar, which is in thermal equilibrium with primordial plasma. In this scenario, axions are efficiently produced during the parametric resonance decay of the complex Peccei-Quinn field, relaxing to the minimum of its potential in the radiation-dominated stage. Notably, this process is not affected by the Universe's expansion rate and allows to generate the required abundance of dark matter independently of an axion mass. Phenomenological constraints on the model parameter space depend on the number density of radial field fluctuations, which are also generically excited along with axions, and the rate of their thermalization in the primordial plasma. For the ratio of radial field and axion particles number densities larger than ∼ 0.01 at the end of parametric resonance decay, the combination of cosmological and astrophysical observations with the CAST limit confines the Peccei-Quinn scale to a narrow range of values ∼ 10⁸ GeV, — this paves the way for ruling out our scenario with the near future searches for axions.

We propose an extension of the Higgs inflation to the hybrid metric-Palatini gravity, where we introduce non-minimal couplings between Higgs and both the metric-type and the Palatini-type Ricci scalars. We study the inflationary phenomenology of our model and find that slow-roll inflation can be realized in the large-field regime, giving the observationally favored predictions. In particular, the scalar spectral index exhibits an attractor behavior to  n_s ∼ 0.964, while the tensor-to-scalar ratio can take an arbitrary value depending on the non-minimal coupling parameters, with the metric-Higgs limit r ∼ 10^-3 being the maximum. We also investigate the unitarity property of our model. As the ultraviolet (UV) cutoff as a low-energy effective field theory (EFT) of this model is significantly lower than the Planck scale due to a strong curvature of field-space, we consider a possible candidate of UV-extended theories with an additional scalar field introduced so as to flatten the field-space in five-dimension. While the field-space can be flatten completely and this approach can lead to a weakly-coupled EFT, we gain an implication that Planck-scale EFT can be only realized in the limit of metric-Higgs inflation. We also discuss generalizations of the model up to mass-dimension four.

Velocity dispersion of the massive neutrinos presents a daunting challenge for non-linear cosmological perturbation theory. We consider the neutrino population as a collection of non-linear fluids, each with uniform initial momentum, through an extension of the Time Renormalization Group perturbation theory. Employing recently-developed Fast Fourier Transform techniques, we accelerate our non-linear perturbation theory by more than two orders of magnitude, making it quick enough for practical use. After verifying that the neutrino mode-coupling integrals and power spectra converge, we show that our perturbation theory agrees with N-body neutrino simulations to within 10% for neutrino fractions Ω_ν,0h² ≤ 0.005 up to wave numbers of k = 1 h/Mpc, an accuracy consistent with ≤ 2.5% errors in the neutrino mass determination. Non-linear growth represents a > 10% correction to the neutrino power spectrum even for density fractions as low as Ω_ν,0h² = 0.001, demonstrating the limits of linear theory for accurate neutrino power spectrum predictions. Our code FlowsForTheMasses is avaliable online at github.com/upadhye/FlowsForTheMasses.

The Gaia space telescope allows for unprecedented accuracy for astrometric measurements of stars in the Galaxy. In this work, we explore the sensitivity of Gaia to detect primordial black hole (PBH) dark matter through the distortions that PBHs would create in the apparent trajectories of background stars, an effect known as astrometric microlensing (AML). We present a novel calculation of the lensing probability, and we combine this with the existing publicly released Gaia eDR3 stellar catalog to predict the expected rate of AML events that Gaia will see. We also compute the expected distribution of a few event observables, which will be useful for reducing backgrounds. Assuming that the astrophysical background rate of AML like events due to other sources is negligible, we then compute the potential exclusion that could be set on the parameter space of PBHs with a monochromatic mass function. We find that Gaia is sensitive to PBHs in the range of 0.4 M_⊙–5 × 10⁷ M_⊙, and has peak sensitivity to PBHs of ∼ 10 M_⊙ for which it can rule out as little as a fraction 3 × 10^-4 of dark matter composed of PBHs. With this exquisite sensitivity, Gaia has the potential to rule out a PBH origin for the gravitational wave signals seen at LIGO/Virgo. Our novel calculation of the lensing probability includes for the first time, the effect of intermediate duration lensing events, where the lensing event lasts for a few years, but for a period which is still shorter than the Gaia mission lifetime. The lower end of our predicted mass exclusion is especially sensitive to this class of lensing events. As and when time-series data for Gaia is released, and once we have a better understanding of the astrophysical background rate to AML signals, our prediction of the lensing rate and event observable distributions will be useful to estimate the true exclusion/discovery of the PBH parameter space utilizing this data.

Primordial black holes (PBHs) whose masses are in ∼ [10^-15M_⊙,10^-11M_⊙] have been extensively studied as a candidate of whole dark matter (DM). One of the probes to test such a PBH-DM scenario is scalar-induced stochastic gravitational waves (GWs) accompanied with the enhanced primordial fluctuations to form the PBH with frequency peaked in the mHz band being targeted by the LISA mission. In order to utilize the stochastic GW for checking the PBH-DM scenario, it needs to exactly relate the PBH abundance and the amplitude of the GW spectrum. Recently in Kitajima et al. [1], the impact of the non-Gaussianity of the enhanced primordial curvature perturbations on the PBH abundance has been investigated based on the peak theory, and they found that a specific non-Gaussian feature called the exponential tail significantly increases the PBH abundance compared with the Gaussian case. In this work, we investigate the spectrum of the induced stochastic GW associated with PBH DM in the exponential-tail case. In order to take into account the non-Gaussianity properly, we employ the diagrammatic approach for the calculation of the spectrum. We find that the amplitude of the stochastic GW spectrum is slightly lower than the one for the Gaussian case, but it can still be detectable with the LISA sensitivity. We also find that the non-Gaussian contribution can appear on the high-frequency side through their complicated momentum configurations. Although this feature emerges under the LISA sensitivity, it might be possible to obtain information about the non-Gaussianity from GW observation with a deeper sensitivity such as the DECIGO mission.

Primordial non-Gaussianities from multi-field inflation are a leading target for cosmological observations, because of the possible large correlations generated between long and short distances. These signatures are captured by the local shape of the scalar bispectrum. In this paper, we revisit the nonlinearities of the conversion process from additional light scalars into curvature perturbations during inflation. We provide analytic templates for correlation functions valid at any kinematical configuration, using the cosmological bootstrap as a main computational tool. Our results include the possibility of large breaking of boost symmetry, in the form of small speeds of sound for both the inflaton and the mediators. We consider correlators coming from the tree-level exchange of a massless scalar field. By introducing a late-time cutoff, we identify that the symmetry constraints on the correlators are modified. This leads to anomalous conformal Ward identities, and consequently the bootstrap differential equations acquire a source term that depends on this cutoff. The solutions to the differential equations are scalar seed functions that incorporate these late-time growth effects. Applying weight-shifting operators to auxiliary "seed" functions, we obtain a systematic classification of shapes of non-Gaussianity coming from massless exchange. For theories with de Sitter symmetry, we compare the resulting shapes with the ones obtained via the δN formalism, identifying missing contributions away from the squeezed limit. For boost-breaking scenarios, we derive a novel class of shape functions with phenomenologically distinct features in scale-invariant theories. Specifically, the new shape provides a simple extension of equilateral non-Gaussianity: the signal peaks at a geometric configuration controlled by the ratio of the sound speeds of the mediator and the inflaton.

This is the second paper in a series whose aim is to predict the power spectrum of intensity and polarized intensity from cosmic reionization fronts. After building the analytic models for intensity and polarized intensity calculations in paper I, here we apply these models to simulations of reionization. We construct a geometric model for identifying front boundaries, calculate the intensity and polarized intensity for each front, and compute a power spectrum of these results. This method was applied to different simulation sizes and resolutions, so we ensure that our results are convergent. We find that the power spectrum of fluctuations at z = 8 in a bin of width Δz = 0.5 (λ/Δλ = 18) is Δ_ℓ ≡ [ℓ(ℓ + 1)C_ℓ/2π]^1/2 is 3.2 × 10^-11 erg s^-1 cm^-2 sr^-1 for the intensity I, 7.6 × 10^-13 erg s^-1 cm^-2 sr^-1 for the E-mode polarization, and 5.8 × 10^-13 erg s^-1 cm^-2 sr^-1 for the B-mode polarization at ℓ = 1.5 × 10⁴. After computing the power spectrum, we compare results to detectable scales and discuss implications for observing this signal based on a proposed experiment. We find that, while fundamental physics does not exclude this kind of mapping from being attainable, an experiment would need to be highly ambitious and require significant advances to make mapping Lyman-α polarization from cosmic reionization fronts a feasible goal.

In this paper, we present the formalism of simulating Lyman-α emission and polarization around reionization (z = 8) from a plane-parallel ionization front. We accomplish this by using a Monte Carlo method to simulate the production of a Lyman-α photon, its propagation through an ionization front, and the eventual escape of this photon. This paper focuses on the relation of the input parameters of ionization front speed U, blackbody temperature T_bb, and neutral hydrogen density n_HI, on intensity I and polarized intensity P as seen by a distant observer. The resulting values of intensity range from 3.18 × 10^-14 erg/cm²/s/sr to 1.96 × 10^-9 erg/cm²/s/sr , and the polarized intensity ranges from 5.73 × 10^-17 erg/cm²/s/sr to 5.31 × 10^-12 erg/cm²/s/sr. We found that higher T_bb, higher U, and higher n_HI contribute to higher intensity, as well as polarized intensity, though the strongest dependence was on the hydrogen density. The dependence of viewing angle of the front is also explored. We present tests to support the validity model, which makes the model suitable for further use in a following paper where we will calculate the intensity and polarized intensity power spectrum on a full reionization simulation.

We present a Lagrangian model of galaxy clustering bias in which we train a neural net using the local properties of the smoothed initial density field to predict the late-time mass-weighted halo field. By fitting the mass-weighted halo field in the AbacusSummit simulations at z = 0.5, we find that including three coarsely spaced smoothing scales gives the best recovery of the halo power spectrum. Adding more smoothing scales may lead to 2–5% underestimation of the large-scale power and can cause the neural net to overfit. We find that the fitted halo-to-mass ratio can be well described by two directions in the original high-dimension feature space. Projecting the original features into these two principal components and re-training the neural net either reproduces the original training result, or outperforms it with a better match of the halo power spectrum. The elements of the principal components are unlikely to be assigned physical meanings, partly owing to the features being highly correlated between different smoothing scales. Our work illustrates a potential need to include multiple smoothing scales when studying galaxy bias, and this can be done easily with machine-learning methods that can take in high dimensional input feature space.

In this work, we present an effective field theory for string inflation with spontaneously broken supersymmetry without generating any supersymmetric anti-de Sitter vacua. In that regard, we analyze the nilpotent superfields that effectively capture the physics of anti-D3 branes, and obtain the underlying pattern of universal attractors with a single parameter. Accordingly, we reveal a novel uplifting method by adding the same parameter as a complex contribution parallel to the decomposition of a superfield. Following that, we obtain an almost vanishing cosmological constant in a region where the inflationary attractors unify. Finally, we show that the introduction of nilpotent superfields drastically extends the string landscape for the de Sitter (swampland) conjecture, and the (super)universal attractors are in the string landscape in that respect.

The growing evidence of gravitational waves from binary black hole mergers has renewed the interest in study of primordial black holes (PBH). Here we study a mechanism for the formation of PBH from collapse of pseudo-topological domain walls which form out of equilibrium during inflation and then collapse post inflation. We apply the study to domain wall formation due to D-parity embedded in a supersymmetric grand unified theory (GUT) based on SO(10) and compare the abundance of resulting PBH with the existing constraints. Thus the macroscopic relics can then be used to constrain or rule out a GUT, or demand a refinement of the theory of PBH formation in this class of GUTs.

In this work we describe metric-affine theories anew by making a change of field variables. A series of equivalent frameworks is presented and identifications are worked out in detail. The advantage of applying the new frameworks is that any MAG theory can be handled as a Riemannian theory with additional fields. We study the Hilbert-Palatini action using the new field variables and disclose interesting symmetries under SO transformations in field space. Then, we use solvable and suitable Riemannian theories as seed models for solvable MAG theories, restricting ourselves to three examples. We present a black hole solution with torsion and non-metricity which under a certain tuning acquires a regular core. A de Sitter universe with the expansion powered by 3-form torsion, is also reported.

In this work, we theoretically assume that a compact object (CO) has a dark surface such that this simplified CO has no emissions and no reflections. Considering that the radius of the surface can be located inside or outside the photon region, which is closely related to the shadow curve, we investigate whether a CO without an event horizon can produce shadow structures similar to those of black holes and compare the shadows of COs with and without horizons. In particular, by introducing the (possible) observational photon region, we analytically construct an exact correspondence between the shadow curves and the impact parameters of photons; we find that there are indeed several differences between the shadows of COs without horizons and those of black holes. More precisely, we find that the shadow curve is still determined by the photon region when the radius of the surface is small enough to retain a whole photon region outside the shell. When only part of the photon region remains, the shadow curve is partially determined by the photon region, and the remaining portion of the shadow curve is partly controlled by the impact parameters of photons that have a turning point on the surface. When there is no photon region outside the surface, the shadow curve is totally controlled by the impact parameters of photons, which have a turning point on the surface.

We perform a detailed comparison of the dynamics of cosmic string loops obtained in cosmological field theory simulations with their expected motion according to the Nambu-Goto action. We demonstrate that these loops follow the trajectories predicted within the NG effective theory except in regions of high curvature where energy is emitted from the loop in the form of massive radiation. This energy loss continues for all the loops studied in this simulation until they self-intersect or become small enough that they annihilate and disappear well before they complete a single oscillation. We comment on the relevance of this investigation to the interpretation of the results from cosmological field theory simulations as well as their extrapolation to a cosmological context.

In this work, we study dark matter (DM) admixed strange quark stars exploring the different possibilities about the nature of the DM and their effects on the macroscopic properties of strange stars, such as maximum masses, radii, as well the dimensionless tidal parameter. We observe that the DM significantly affects the macroscopic properties that depend on its mass, type, and fraction inside the star.

The halo occupation distribution (HOD) framework is an empirical method to describe the connection between dark matter halos and galaxies, which is constrained by small scale clustering data. Efficient fitting procedures are required to scan the HOD parameter space. This paper describes such a method based on Gaussian Processes to iteratively build a surrogate model of the posterior of the likelihood surface from a reasonable amount of likelihood computations, typically two orders of magnitude less than standard Monte Carlo Markov chain algorithms. Errors in the likelihood computation due to stochastic HOD modelling are also accounted for in the method we propose. We report results of reproducibility, accuracy and stability tests of the method derived from simulation, taking as a test case star-forming emission line galaxies, which constitute the main tracer of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument and have so far a poorly constrained galaxy-halo connection from observational data.

Early dark energy (EDE) models have attracted attention in the context of the recent problem of the Hubble tension. Here we extend these models by taking into account the new density fluctuations generated by the EDE which decays around the recombination phase. We solve the evolution of the density perturbations in dark energy fluid generated at the phase transition of EDE as isocurvature perturbations. Assuming that the isocurvature mode is characterized by a power-law power spectrum and is uncorrelated with the standard adiabatic mode, we calculate the CMB angular power spectra. By comparing them to the Planck data using the Markov-Chain Monte Carlo method, we obtained zero-consistent values of the EDE parameters and H₀ = 67.56^+0.65_-0.66 km s^-1 Mpc^-1 at 68 % CL. This H₀ value is almost the same as the Planck value in the ΛCDM model, H₀ = 67.36 ± 0.54 km s^-1 Mpc^-1, and there is still a ∼ 3.5σ tension between the CMB and Type Ia supernovae observations. Including CMB lensing, BAO, supernovae and SH0ES data sets, we find H₀ = 68.94^+0.47_-0.57 km s^-1 Mpc^-1 at 68 % CL. The amplitude of the fluctuations induced by the phase transition of the EDE is constrained to be less than 1–2 percent of the amplitude of the adiabatic mode. This is so small that such non-standard fluctuations cannot appear in the CMB angular spectra. In conclusion, the isocurvature fluctuations induced by our simplest EDE phase transition model do not explain the Hubble tension well.

We use the Magneticum suite of state-of-the-art hydrodynamical simulations to identify cosmic voids based on the watershed technique and investigate their most fundamental properties across different resolutions in mass and scale. This encompasses the distributions of void sizes, shapes, and content, as well as their radial density and velocity profiles traced by the distribution of cold dark matter particles and halos. We also study the impact of various tracer properties, such as their sparsity and mass, and the influence of void merging on these summary statistics. Our results reveal that all of the analyzed void properties are physically related to each other and describe universal characteristics that are largely independent of tracer type and resolution. Most notably, we find that the motion of tracers around void centers is perfectly consistent with linear dynamics, both for individual, as well as stacked voids. Despite the large range of scales accessible in our simulations, we are unable to identify the occurrence of nonlinear dynamics even inside voids of only a few Mpc in size. This suggests voids to be among the most pristine probes of cosmology down to scales that are commonly referred to as highly nonlinear in the field of large-scale structure.

Gravitational waves (GWs) emitted by binary sources are interesting signals for testing gravity on cosmological scales since they allow measurements of the luminosity distance. When followed by electromagnetic counterparts, in particular, they enable a reconstruction of the GW-distance-redshift relation. In the context of several modified gravity (MG) theories, even when requiring that the speed of propagation is equal to that of light, this GW distance differs from the standard electromagnetic luminosity distance due to the presence of a modified friction in the GW propagation. The very same source of this friction, which is the running of an effective Planck mass, also affects the scalar sector generating gravitational slip, i.e. a difference between the scalar potentials, an observable that can be inferred from large-scale structure (LSS) probes. In this work, we use a model within effective field theories for dark energy to exemplify precisely the fact that, at the linear perturbation level, parametrizing a single function is already enough to generate simultaneous deviations in the GW distance and the slip. By simulating multimessenger GW events that might be detected by the Einstein Telescope in the future, we compare the constraining power of the two observables on this single degree of freedom. We then combine forecasts of an Euclid-like survey with GW simulations, coming to the conclusion that, when using Planck data to better constrain the cosmological parameters, those future data on the scalar and tensor sectors are competitive to probe such deviations from General Relativity, with LSS giving stronger (but more model-dependent) results than GWs.

High energy gamma-rays propagating in external magnetic fields may convert into axion-like particles (ALPs). In this case, the observed gamma-ray spectra are modified by the resulting energy-dependent conversion probability. In this study, we use the energy spectra of 20 extra-galactic gamma-ray sources recorded during 10 years of Fermi-LAT observations. We define a test statistics based upon the likelihood ratio to test the hypothesis for a spectral model without vs. a model with photon-ALPs coupling. The conversion probability is calculated for fixed values of the mass and two-photon coupling of the pseudo-scalar particle while the external magnetic field is characterized by the additional free parameters length scale s and average field strength B. As a consistency check and in order to extend the analysis to include very high energy gamma-ray data, another test statistics is defined with the χ² method. We find for 18 of the 20 sources a favorable fit, particularly for Markarian 421 and NGC 1275 a significant improvement, with the hypothesis of photon-ALPs coupling in likelihood analysis. The test statistics of the sources are combined and the significance has been estimated 5.3σ (test statistics summed in local maxima of all sources) and 6.0σ (global maxima). The significance is estimated from dedicated simulations under the null hypotheses. The locally best-fitting values of B and s fall into the range that is expected for large scale magnetic fields present in relevant astrophysical environments.

We consider the production of axion dark matter through the misalignment mechanism in the context of a nonstandard cosmological history involving early matter domination by a scalar field with a time-dependent decay rate. In cases where the temperature of the Universe experiences a temporary period of increase, Hubble friction can be restored in the evolution of the axion field, resulting in the possibility of up to three "crossings" of the axion mass and the Hubble expansion rate. This has the effect of dynamically resetting the misalignment mechanism to a new initial state for a second distinct phase of oscillation. The resultant axion mass required for the present dark matter relic density is never bigger than the standard-history window and can be smaller by more than three orders of magnitude, which can be probed by upcoming experiments such as ABRACADABRA, KLASH, ADMX, MADMAX, and ORGAN, targeting the axion-photon coupling. This highlights the possibility of exploring the cosmological history prior to Big Bang Nucleosynthesis through searches for axion dark matter beyond the standard window.

The effects of dark matter spike in the vicinity of the supermassive black hole, located at the center of M87 (the Virgo A galaxy), are investigated within the framework of the so-called Bumblebee Gravity. Our primary aim is to determine whether the background of spontaneous Lorentz symmetry breaking has a significant effect on the horizon, ergo-region, and shadow of the Kerr Bumblebee black hole in the spike region. For this purpose, we first incorporate the dark matter distribution in a Lorentz-violating spherically symmetric space-time as a component of the energy-momentum tensors in the Einstein field equations. This leads to a space-time metric for a Schwarzschild Bumblebee black hole with a dark matter distribution in the spike region and beyond. Subsequently, this solution is generalized to a Kerr Bumblebee black hole through the use of the Newman-Janis-Azreg-Aïnou algorithm. Then, according to the available observational data for the dark matter spike density and radius, and the Schwarzschild radius of the supermassive black hole in Virgo A galaxy, we examine the shapes of shadow and demonstrate the influence of the spin parameter a, the Lorentz-violating parameter ℓ and the corresponding dark matter halo parameters ρ₀ and r₀ on the deformation and size of the shadow.

Cosmic birefringence is the in-vacuo rotation of the linear polarization plane experienced by photons of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation when theoretically well-motivated parity-violating extensions of Maxwell electromagnetism are considered. If the angle parametrizing such a rotation is dependent on the photon's direction, then this phenomenon is called Anisotropic Cosmic Birefringence (ACB). In this paper, we perform for the first time a tomographic treatment of the ACB, by considering photons emitted both at the recombination and reionization epoch. This allows one to extract additional and complementary information about the physical source of cosmic birefringence with respect to the isotropic case. We focus here on the case of an axion-like field χ, whose coupling with the electromagnetic sector induces such a phenomenon, by using an analytical and numerical approach (which involves a modification of the CLASS code). We find that the anisotropic component of cosmic birefringence exhibits a peculiar behavior: an increase of the axion mass implies an enhancement of the anisotropic amplitude, allowing to probe a wider range of masses with respect to the purely isotropic case. Moreover, we show that at large angular scales, the interplay between the reionization and recombination contributions to ACB is sensitive to the axion mass, so that at sufficiently low multipoles, for sufficiently light masses, the reionization contribution overtakes the recombination one, making the tomographic approach to cosmic birefringence a promising tool for investigating the properties of this axion-like field.

Bayesian parameter inference is an essential tool in modern cosmology, and typically requires the calculation of 10⁵–10⁶ theoretical models for each inference of model parameters for a given dataset combination. Computing these models by solving the linearised Einstein-Boltzmann system usually takes tens of CPU core-seconds per model, making the entire process very computationally expensive. In this paper we present connect, a neural network framework emulating class computations as an easy-to-use plug-in for the popular sampler MontePython. connect uses an iteratively trained neural network which emulates the observables usually computed by class. The training data is generated using class, but using a novel algorithm for generating favourable points in parameter space for training data, the required number of class-evaluations can be reduced by two orders of magnitude compared to a traditional inference run. Once connect has been trained for a given model, no additional training is required for different dataset combinations, making connect many orders of magnitude faster than class (and making the inference process entirely dominated by the speed of the likelihood calculation). For the models investigated in this paper we find that cosmological parameter inference run with connect produces posteriors which differ from the posteriors derived using class by typically less than 0.01–0.1 standard deviations for all parameters. We also stress that the training data can be produced in parallel, making efficient use of all available compute resources. The connect code is publicly available for download on GitHub (https://github.com/AarhusCosmology/connect_public).

In this work we present the interpretation of the energy spectrum and mass composition data as measured by the Pierre Auger Collaboration above 6 × 10¹⁷ eV. We use an astrophysical model with two extragalactic source populations to model the hardening of the cosmic-ray flux at around 5 × 10¹⁸ eV (the so-called "ankle" feature) as a transition between these two components. We find our data to be well reproduced if sources above the ankle emit a mixed composition with a hard spectrum and a low rigidity cutoff. The component below the ankle is required to have a very soft spectrum and a mix of protons and intermediate-mass nuclei. The origin of this intermediate-mass component is not well constrained and it could originate from either Galactic or extragalactic sources. To the aim of evaluating our capability to constrain astrophysical models, we discuss the impact on the fit results of the main experimental systematic uncertainties and of the assumptions about quantities affecting the air shower development as well as the propagation and redshift distribution of injected ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs).

We investigate the production of gravitational waves (GWs) during preheating with monomial/polynomial inflationary potentials, considering a trilinear coupling ϕχ² between a singlet inflaton ϕ and a daughter scalar field χ. For sufficiently large couplings, the trilinear interaction leads to an exponential production of χ particles and, as a result, a large stochastic GW background (SGWB) is generated throughout the process. We study the linear and non-linear dynamics of preheating with lattice simulations, following the production of GWs through all relevant stages. We find that large couplings lead to SGWBs with amplitudes today that can reach up to h²Ω_GW⁽⁰⁾ ≃ 5 · 10^-9. These backgrounds are however peaked at high frequencies f_p ≳ 5 · 10⁶ Hz, which makes them undetectable by current/planned GW observatories. As the amount of GWs produced is in any case remarkable, we discuss the prospects for probing the SGWB indirectly by using constraints on the effective number of relativistic species in the universe N_eff.

We consider a Proca-Higgs model wherein a complex vector field gains mass via spontaneous symmetry breaking, by coupling to a real scalar field with a Higgs-type potential. This vector version of the scalar Friedberg-Lee-Sirlin model, can be considered as a UV completion of a complex Proca model with self-interactions. We study the flat spacetime and self-gravitating solitons of the model, that we dub Proca-Higgs balls and stars respectively, exploring the domain of solutions and describing some of their mathematical and physical properties. The stars reduce to the well-known (mini-)Proca stars in some limits. The full model evades the hyperbolicity problems of the self-interacting Proca models, offering novel possibilities for dynamical studies beyond mini-Proca stars.

We use the surface detector of the Pierre Auger Observatory to search for air showers initiated by photons with an energy above 10¹⁹ eV. Photons in the zenith angle range from 30^∘ to 60^∘ can be identified in the overwhelming background of showers initiated by charged cosmic rays through the broader time structure of the signals induced in the water-Cherenkov detectors of the array and the steeper lateral distribution of shower particles reaching ground. Applying the search method to data collected between January 2004 and June 2020, upper limits at 95% CL are set to an E^-2 diffuse flux of ultra-high energy photons above 10¹⁹ eV, 2 × 10¹⁹ eV and 4 × 10¹⁹ eV amounting to 2.11 × 10^-3, 3.12 × 10^-4 and 1.72 × 10^-4 km^-2 sr^-1 yr^-1, respectively. While the sensitivity of the present search around 2 × 10¹⁹ eV approaches expectations of cosmogenic photon fluxes in the case of a pure-proton composition, it is one order of magnitude above those from more realistic mixed-composition models. The inferred limits have also implications for the search of super-heavy dark matter that are discussed and illustrated.

We derive consistency conditions for sustained slow roll and rapid turn inflation in two-field cosmological models with oriented scalar field space, which imply that inflationary models with field-space trajectories of this type are non-generic. In particular, we show that third order adiabatic slow roll, together with large and slowly varying turn rate, requires the scalar potential of the model to satisfy a certain nonlinear second order PDE, whose coefficients depend on the scalar field metric. We also derive consistency conditions for slow roll inflationary solutions in the so called "rapid turn attractor" approximation, as well as study the consistency conditions for circular rapid turn trajectories with slow roll in two-field models with rotationally invariant field space metric. Finally, we argue that the rapid turn regime tends to have a natural exit after a limited number of e-folds.

We revisit graviton production via Bremsstrahlung from the decay of the inflaton during inflationary reheating. Using two complementary computational techniques, we first show that such 3-body differential decay rates differ from previously reported results in the literature. We then compute the stochastic gravitational wave (GW) background that forms during the period of reheating, when the inflaton perturbatively decays with the radiative emission of gravitons. By computing the number of relativistic degrees of freedom in terms of Δ N_eff, we constrain the resulting GW energy density from BBN and CMB. Finally, we project current and future GW detector sensitivities in probing such a stochastic GW background, which typically peaks in the GHz to THz ballpark, opening up the opportunity to be detected with microwave cavities and space-based GW detectors.

The four-point correlation function of primordial scalar perturbations has parity-even and parity-odd contributions and the parity-odd signal in cosmological observations is opening a novel window to look for new physics in the inflationary epoch. We study the distinct parity-odd and even prediction from the axion inflation model, in which the inflaton couples to a vector field via a Chern-Simons interaction, and the vector field is considered to be either approximately massless (m_A ≪ Hubble scale H) or very massive (m_A ∼ H). The parity-odd signal arises due to one transverse mode of the vector field being predominantly produced during inflation. We adopt the in-in formalism to evaluate the correlation functions. Considering the vector field mode function to be dominated by its real part up to a constant phase, we simplify the formulas for numerical computations. The numerical studies show that the massive and massless vector fields give significant parity-even signals, while the parity-odd contribution is about one to two orders of magnitude smaller.

With the measurement of the electromagnetic (EM) counterpart, a gravitational wave (GW) event could be treated as a standard siren. As a novel cosmological probe, GW standard sirens will bring significant implications for cosmology. In this paper, by considering the coincident detections of GW and associated γ ray burst (GRB), we find that only about 400 GW bright standard sirens from binary neutron star mergers could be detected in a 10-year observation of the Einstein Telescope and the THESEUS satellite mission. Based on this mock sample, we investigate the implications of GW standard sirens on the interaction between dark energy and dark matter. In our analysis, four viable interacting dark energy (IDE) models, with interaction forms Q = 3βHρ_de and Q = Q = 3βHρ_c, are considered. Compared with the traditional EM observational data such as CMB, BAO, and SN Ia, the combination of both GW and EM observations could effectively break the degeneracies between different cosmological parameters and provide more stringent cosmological fits. We find that the GW data could play a more important role for determining the interaction in the models with Q = 3βHρ_c, compared with the models with Q = 3βHρ_de. We also show that constraining IDE models with mock GW data based on different fiducial H₀ values yield different results, indicating that accurate determination of H₀ is significant for exploring the interaction between dark energy and dark matter.

We investigate the cosmic evolutions in the extended Starobinsky model (eSM) obtained by adding one R^abR_ab term to the Starobinsky model. We discuss the possibility of various cosmic evolutions with a special focus on the radiation-dominated era (RDE). Using simple assumptions, a second-order non-linear differential equation describing the various cosmic evolutions in the eSM is introduced. By solving this non-linear equation numerically, we show that the various cosmic evolutions, such as the standard cosmic evolution (a ∝ t^1/2) and a unique oscillating cosmic evolution, are feasible due to the effects of higher-order terms introduced beyond Einstein's gravity. Furthermore, we consider big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN), which is the most important observational result in the RDE, to constrain the free parameters of the eSM. The primordial abundances of the light elements, such as ⁴He, D, ³He,⁷Li, and ⁶Li by the cosmic evolutions are compared with the most recent observational data. It turns out that most non-standard cosmic evolutions can not easily satisfy these BBN constraints, but a free parameter of the viable models with the oscillating cosmic evolution is shown to have an upper limit by the constraints. In particular, we find that the free parameter is most sensitive to deuterium and ⁴He abundances, which are being precisely measured among other elements. Therefore, more accurate measurements in the near future may enable us to distinguish the eSM from the standard model as well as other models.

Wave-like dark matter made of spin-1 particles (dark photons) is expected to form ground state clumps called "vector solitons", which can have different polarizations. In this work, we consider the interaction of dark photons with photons, expressed as dimension-6 operators, and study the electromagnetic radiation that arises from an isolated vector soliton due to parametric resonant amplification of the ambient electromagnetic field. We characterize the directional dependence and polarization of the outgoing radiation, which depends on the operator as well as the polarization state of the underlying vector soliton. We discuss the implications of this radiation for the stability of solitons and as a possible channel for detecting mergers of vector solitons through astrophysical observations.

We analyse the evolution of the largest ionized region using the topological and morphological evolution of the redshifted 21-cm signal coming from the neutral hydrogen distribution during the different stages of reionization. For this analysis, we use the "Largest Cluster Statistics" — LCS. We mainly study the impact of the array synthesized beam on the LCS analysis of the 21-cm signal considering the upcoming low-frequency Square Kilometer Array (SKA1-Low) observations using a realistic simulation for such observation based on the 21cmE2E-pipeline using OSKAR. We find that bias in LCS estimation is introduced in synthetic observations due to the array beam. This in turn shifts the apparent percolation transition point towards the later stages of reionization. The biased estimates of LCS, occurring due to the effect of the lower resolution (lack of longer baselines) and the telescope synthesized beam will lead to a biased interpretation of the reionization history. This is important to note while interpreting any future 21-cm signal images from upcoming or future telescopes like the SKA, HERA, etc. We conclude that one may need denser uv-coverage at longer baselines for a better deconvolution of the array synthesized beam from the 21-cm images and a relatively unbiased estimate of LCS from such images.

We show that supersymmetry and inflation, in a broad class of models, generically lead to formation of primordial black holes (PBHs) that can account for dark matter. Supersymmetry predicts a number of scalar fields that develop a coherent condensate along the flat directions of the potential at the end of inflation. The subsequent evolution of the condensate involves perturbative decay, as well as fragmentation into Q-balls, which can interact by some long-range forces mediated by the scalar fields. The attractive scalar long-range interactions between Q-balls facilitates the growth of Q-balls until their ultimate collapse to black holes. For a flat direction lifted by supersymmetry breaking at the scale Λ ∼ 100 TeV, the black hole masses are of the order of (M³_Planck/Λ²) ∼ 10²² g, in the allowed range for dark matter. Similar potentials with a lower scale Λ (not necessarily associated with supersymmetry) can result in a population of primordial black holes with larger masses, which can explain some recently reported microlensing events.

The role of baryonic physics, star formation and stellar feedback, in shaping the galaxies and their host halos is an evolving topic. The dark matter aspects are illustrated in this work by showing distribution features in a Milky Way sized halo. We focus on the halo morphology, geometry, and profile as well as the phase space distribution using one dark matter only and five hydrodynamical cosmological high-resolution simulations of the same halo with different subgrid prescriptions for the baryonic physics (Kennicut versus multi-freefall star formation and delayed cooling versus mechanical supernovae feedback). If some general properties like the relative halo-galaxy orientation are similar, the modifications of the gravitational potential due to the presence of baryons are found to induce different dark matter distributions (rounder and more concentrated halo). The mass density profile as well as the velocity distribution are modified distinctively according to the specific resulting baryonic distribution highlighting the variability of those properties (e.g inner power index from 1.3 to 1.8, broader speed distribution). The uncertainties on those features are of paramount importance for dark matter phenomenology, particularly when dealing with dark matter dynamics or direct and indirect detection searches. As a consequence, dark matter properties and prospects using cosmological simulations require improvement on baryonic physics description. Modeling such processes is a key issue not only for galaxy formation but also for dark matter investigations.

We study the dynamics of domain wall solitons in (2+1)d field theories. These objects are extended along one of the spatial directions, so they also behave as strings; hence the name of domain wall strings. We show analytically and numerically that the amount of radiation from the propagation of wiggles on these objects is negligible except for regions of high curvature. Therefore, at low curvatures, the domain wall strings behave exactly as the Nambu-Goto action predicts. We show this explicitly with the use of several different numerical experiments of the evolution of these objects in a lattice. We then explore their dynamics in the presence of internal mode excitations. We do this again by performing field theory simulations and identify an effective action that captures the relevant interactions between the different degrees of freedom living on the string. We uncover a new parametric resonance instability that transfers energy from the internal mode to the position of the domain wall. We show that this instability accelerates the radiation of the internal mode energy. We also explore the possibility of exciting the internal mode of the soliton with the collision of wiggles on the domain wall. Our numerical experiments indicate that this does not happen unless the wiggles have already a wavelength of the order of the string thickness. Finally, we comment on the possible relevance of our findings to cosmological networks of defects. We argue that our results cast some doubts on the significance of the internal modes in cosmological applications beyond a brief transient period right after their formation. This, however, should be further investigated using cosmological simulations of our model.

In this study, we investigate the growth of structures within the Deser-Woodard nonlocal theory and extend it to various bouncing cosmology scenarios. Our findings show that the observable structure growth rate, fσ₈, in a vacuum-dominated universe is finite within the redshift range of 0 < z < 2, contrary to previous literature. Although fσ₈ exhibits no divergences, we observe a slight difference between the evolution of the ΛCDM and the non-local DW II models. Regarding structure formation in bouncing cosmologies, we evaluate the evolution of fσ₈ near the bouncing point. Among the different bouncing cases we explore, the oscillatory bounce and pre-inflationary asymmetrical bounce demonstrate a physical profile where the growth rate begins as a small perturbation in the early epoch and increases with inflation, which can be regarded as the seeds of large-scale structures. These findings are significant because they shed light on the growth of seed fluctuations into cosmic structures resulting from non-local effects.

We present asevolution, a cosmological N-body code developed based on gevolution, which consistently solves for the (a)symmetron scalar field and metric potentials within the weak-field approximation. In asevolution, the scalar field is dynamic and can form non-linear structures. A cubic term is added in the symmetron potential to make the symmetry-broken vacuum expectation values different, which is motivated by observational tensions in the late-time universe. To study the effects of the scalar field dynamics, we also implement a constraint solver making use of the quasi-static approximation, and provide options for evaluating the background evolution, including using the full energy density averaged over the simulation box within the Friedmann equation. The asevolution code is validated by comparison with the Newtonian N-body code ISIS that makes use of the quasi-static approximation. There is found a very small effect of including relativistic and weak-field corrections in our small test simulations; it is seen that for small masses, the field is dynamic and can not be accurately solved for using the quasi-static approximation; and we observe the formation of unstable domain walls and demonstrate a useful way to identify them within the code. A first consideration indicates that the domain walls are more unstable in the asymmetron scenario.

The connection between a hidden nonthermal sector and a thermal plasma can be established by a light thermal fermion mediator. When the fermion mediator is much lighter than the hidden species, kinematically forbidden decay of the mediator can be opened at finite temperatures to produce the hidden species. Unlike bosons having quartic couplings, renormalizable forbidden fermion decay generically shares the same order of couplings with the scattering. We present a dedicated investigation into the freeze-in dark matter production via a thermal fermion mediator. We demonstrate that the plasma-induced decay rate differs from that calculated via the tree-level amplitude, but the former can be obtained from the latter via constant rescaling. Furthermore, we find that the relative effect of the forbidden decay and the scattering on the dark matter relic density can be simply estimated via the thermal coupling between the plasma and the mediator. Applying to different thermal interactions, we show that the forbidden decay contribution can reach the level of 4%- 45% for a thermal coupling at 0.1- 1.

According to the Borde-Guth-Vilenkin (BGV) theorem an expanding region of spacetime cannot be extended to the past beyond some boundary ℬ. Therefore, the inflationary universe must have had some kind of beginning. However, the BGW theorem says nothing about the boundary conditions on ℬ, or even about its location. Here we present a single-scalar field model of the Two-Measure Theory, where the non-Riemannian volume element Υ d⁴x is present in the action. As a result of the model dynamics, an upper bound φ₀ of admissible values of the scalar field φ appears, which sets the position of ℬ  in the form of a spacelike hypersurface Υ(x) = 0 with a boundary condition:  Υ → 0⁺ as φ → φ₀^-. A detailed study has established that if the initial kinetic energy density ρ_kin⁽ⁱⁿ⁾ prevails over initial gradient energy density ρ_grad⁽ⁱⁿ⁾ then there is an interval of initial values  φ_in^(min) ≤ φ_in < φ₀, where ρ_kin⁽ⁱⁿ⁾ and  ρ_grad⁽ⁱⁿ⁾ cannot exceed the potential energy density and hence the initial conditions necessary for the onset of inflation are satisfied. It is shown that under almost all possible left-handed boundary conditions on ℬ, that is where Υ → 0^-, the metric tensor in the Einstein frame has a jump discontinuity on ℬ, so the Christoffel connection coefficients are not defined on the spacelike hypersurface Υ = 0. Thus, if  φ_in^(min) ≤ φ_in < φ₀ and ρ_kin⁽ⁱⁿ⁾ > ρ_grad⁽ⁱⁿ⁾, then there was an inflationary stage in the history of our Universe and the congruence of timelike geodesics cannot be extended to the past beyond the hypersurface Υ = 0.

The slow-roll inflation which took place at extremely high energy regimes is in general believed to be sensitive to the high-order curvature corrections to the classical general relativity (GR). In this paper, we study the effects of the high-order curvature term, the Gauss-Bonnet (GB) term, on the primordial scalar and tensor spectra of the slow-roll inflation in the consistent D → 4 Einstein Gauss-Bonnet (4EGB) gravity. The GB term is incorporated into gravitational dynamics via the re-scaling of the GB coupling constant α → α/(D-4) in the limit D → 4. For our purpose, we calculate explicitly the primordial scalar and tensor power spectra with GB corrections accurate to the next-to-leading order in the slow-roll approximation in the slow-roll inflation by using the third-order uniform asymptotic approximation method. The corresponding spectral indices and their runnings of the spectral indices for both the scalar and tensor perturbations as well as the ratio between the scalar and tensor spectra are also calculated up to the next-to-leading order in the slow-roll expansions. These results represent the most accurate results obtained so far in the literature. In addition, by studying the theoretical predictions of the scalar spectral index and the tensor-to-scalar ratio with Planck 2018 constraint in a model with power-law potential, we show that the second-order corrections are important in future measurements.

We investigate the amplification of curvature perturbations in a two-field inflation model featuring a Gaussian potential bump. When the inflaton encounters a potential bump along the inflationary trajectory, its rolling speed is generally reduced, potentially causing a violation of the slow-roll condition. Consequently, the original decaying modes of comoving curvature perturbations during the slow-roll phase start growing, and lead to enhanced small-scale density perturbations which can produce amounts of primordial black holes (PBHs) and associated scalar-induced gravitational waves. In addition, inflaton also undergoes sudden turnings at the encounter of the Gaussian potential bump, which is insignificant to the overall curvature power spectrum due to the short duration of these turns. Our paper offers a simple example of the extension of a bump-like potential for PBH formation in a single-field inflation to a two-field case, which helps alleviate the fine-tuning of initial conditions to some extent.

The probability of primordial black hole (PBH) formation is known to be boosted during the Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) crossover due to a slight reduction of the equation of state. This induces a high peak and other features in the PBH mass distribution. But the impact of this variation during the process of PBH formation has so far not been considered in numerical simulations. In this work we simulate the formation of PBHs by taking into account the varying equation of state at the QCD epoch, compute the over-density threshold using different curvature profiles and find that the resulting PBH mass distributions are significantly impacted. The expected merger rate distributions of early and late PBH binaries is comparable to the ones inferred from the GWTC-3 catalog for dark matter fractions in PBHs within 0.1 < f_PBH < 1. The distribution of gravitational-wave events estimated from the volume sensitivity could explain mergers around 30–50 M_⊙, with asymmetric masses like GW190814, or in the pair-instability mass gap like GW190521. However, none of the considered cases leads to a multi-modal distribution with a secondary peak around 8–15 M_⊙, as suggested by the GWTC-3 catalog, possibly pointing to a mixed population of astrophysical and primordial black holes.

Recently it has been questioned, notably in the context of the scalar singlet dark matter model with m_φ ≃ 60 GeV, how efficiently kinetic equilibrium is maintained if freeze-out dynamics is pushed down to low temperatures by resonant effects. We outline how Langevin simulations can be employed for addressing the non-equilibrium momentum distribution of non-relativistic particles in a cosmological background. For a scalar singlet mass m_φ ≃ 60 GeV, these simulations suggest that kinetic equilibrium is a good approximation down to T ∼ 1 GeV, with the deviation first manifesting itself as a red-tilted spectrum. This reduces the annihilation cross section, confirming findings from other methods that a somewhat larger (< 20%) coupling than in equilibrium is needed for obtaining the correct abundance.

We study, for the first time, the cross correlation between the angular distribution of radial peculiar velocities (PV) and the lensing convergence of cosmic microwave background (CMB) photons. We derive theoretical expectations for the signal and its covariance and assess its detectability with existing and forthcoming surveys. We find that such cross-correlations are expected to improve constraints on different gravitational models by partially breaking degeneracies with the matter density. We identify in the distance-scaling dispersion of the peculiar velocities the most relevant source of noise in the cross correlation. For this reason, we also study how the above picture changes assuming a redshift-independent scatter for the PV, obtained for example using a reconstruction technique. Our results show that the cross correlation might be detected in the near future combining PV measurements from DESI and the convergence map from CMB-S4. Using realistic direct PV measurements we predict a cumulative signal-to-noise ratio of approximately 3.8σ using data on angular scales 3 ≤ ℓ ≤ 200. For an idealized reconstructed peculiar velocity map extending up to redshift z = 0.15 and a smoothing scale of 4 Mpc h^-1 we predict a cumulative signal-to-noise ratio of approximately 27σ from angular scales 3 ≤ ℓ ≤ 200. We conclude that currently reconstructed peculiar velocities have more constraining power than directly observed ones, even though they are more cosmological-model dependent.

Upcoming large-scale structure surveys can shed new light on the properties of dark energy. In particular, if dark energy is a dynamical component, it must have spatial perturbations. Their behaviour is regulated by the speed of sound parameter, which is currently unconstrained. In this work, we present the numerical methods that will allow to perform cosmological simulations of inhomogeneous dark energy scenarios where the speed of sound is small and non-vanishing. We treat the dark energy component as an effective fluid and build upon established numerical methods for hydrodynamics to construct a numerical solution of the effective continuity and Euler equations. In particular, we develop conservative finite volume schemes that rely on the solution of the Riemann problem, which we provide here in both exact and approximate forms for the case of a dark energy fluid.