Walter Riquelme, Santiago Avila, Juan Garcia-Bellido, Anna Porredon, Ismael Ferrero, Kwan Chuen Chan, Rogerio Rosenfeld, Hugo Camacho, Adrian G. Adame, Aurelio Carnero Rosell, Martin Crocce, Juan De Vicente, Tim Eifler, Jack Elvin-Poole, Xiao Fang, Elisabeth Krause, Martin Rodriguez Monroy, Ashley J. Ross, Eusebio Sanchez, Ignacio Sevilla Local primordial non-Gaussianity (PNG) is a promising observable of the underlying physics of inflation, characterised by $f_{\rm NL}^{\rm loc}$. We present the methodology to measure $f_{\rm NL}^{\rm loc}$ from the Dark Energy Survey (DES) data using the 2-point angular correlation function (ACF) with scale-dependent bias. One of the focuses of the work is the integral constraint. This condition appears when estimating the mean number density of galaxies from the data and is key in obtaining unbiased $f_{\rm NL}^{\rm loc}$ constraints. The methods are analysed for two types of simulations: $\sim 246$ GOLIAT-PNG N-body small area simulations with $f_{\rm NL}$ equal to -100 and 100, and 1952 Gaussian ICE-COLA mocks with $f_{\rm NL}=0$ that follow the DES angular and redshift distribution. We use the ensemble of GOLIAT-PNG mocks to show the importance of the integral constraint when measuring PNG, where we recover the fiducial values of $f_{\rm NL}$ within the $1\sigma$ when including the integral constraint. In contrast, we found a bias of $\Delta f_{\rm NL}\sim 100$ when not including it. For a DES-like scenario, we forecast a bias of $\Delta f_{\rm NL} \sim 23$, equivalent to $1.8\sigma$, when not using the IC for a fiducial value of $f_{\rm NL}=100$. We use the ICE-COLA mocks to validate our analysis in a realistic DES-like setup finding it robust to different analysis choices: best-fit estimator, the effect of IC, BAO damping, covariance, and scale choices. We forecast a measurement of $f_{\rm NL}$ within $\sigma(f_{\rm NL})=31$ when using the DES-Y3 BAO sample, with the ACF in the $1\ {\rm deg}<\theta<20\ {\rm deg}$ range.
A. Carnero Rosell, M. Rodriguez-Monroy, M. Crocce, J. Elvin-Poole, A. Porredon, I. Ferrero, J. Mena-Fernandez, R. Cawthon, J. De Vicente, E. Gaztanaga, A.J. Ross, E. Sanchez, I. Sevilla-Noarbe, O. Alves, F. Andrade-Oliveira, J. Asorey, S. Avila, A. Brandao-Souza, H. Camacho, K.C. Chan, et al (89) In this paper we present and validate the galaxy sample used for the analysis of the Baryon Acoustic Oscillation signal (BAO) in the Dark Energy Survey (DES) Y3 data. The definition is based on a colour and redshift-dependent magnitude cut optimized to select galaxies at redshifts higher than 0.5, while ensuring a high quality photometric redshift determination. The sample covers $\approx 4100$ square degrees to a depth of $i = 22.3 \ (AB)$ at $10\sigma$. It contains 7,031,993 galaxies in the redshift range from $z$= 0.6 to 1.1, with a mean effective redshift of 0.835. Photometric redshifts are estimated with the machine learning algorithm DNF, and are validated using the VIPERS PDR2 sample. We find a mean redshift bias of $z_{\mathrm{bias}} \approx 0.01$ and a mean uncertainty, in units of $1+z$, of $\sigma_{68} \approx 0.03$. We evaluate the galaxy population of the sample, showing it is mostly built upon Elliptical to Sbc types. Furthermore, we find a low level of stellar contamination of $\lesssim 4\%$. We present the method used to mitigate the effect of spurious clustering coming from observing conditions and other large-scale systematics. We apply it to the DES Y3 BAO sample and calculate sample weights that are used to get a robust estimate of the galaxy clustering signal. This paper is one of a series dedicated to the analysis of the BAO signal in the DES Y3 data. In the companion papers, Ferrero et al. (2021) and DES Collaboration (2021), we present the galaxy mock catalogues used to calibrate the analysis and the angular diameter distance constraints obtained through the fitting to the BAO scale, respectively. The galaxy sample, masks and additional material will be released in the public DES data repository upon acceptance.
In this paper, we show how the structure of the landscape potential of the primordial Universe may be probed through the properties of the primordial density perturbations responsible for the origin of the cosmic microwave background anisotropies and the large-scale structure of our Universe. Isocurvature fields -fields orthogonal to the inflationary trajectory- may have fluctuated across the barriers separating local minima of the landscape potential during inflation. We analyze how this process could have impacted the evolution of the primordial curvature perturbations. If the typical distance separating consecutive minima of the landscape potential and the height of the potential barriers are smaller than the Hubble expansion rate parametrizing inflation, the probability distribution function of isocurvature fields becomes non-Gaussian due to the appearance of bumps and dips associated to the structure of the potential. We show that this non-Gaussianity can be transferred to the statistics of primordial curvature perturbations if the isocurvature fields are coupled to the curvature perturbations. The type of non-Gaussian structure that emerges in the distribution of curvature perturbations cannot be fully probed with the standard methods of polyspectra; instead, the probability distribution function is needed. The latter is obtained by summing all the $n$-point correlation functions. To substantiate our claims, we offer a concrete model consisting of an axionlike isocurvature perturbation with a sinusoidal potential and a linear derivative coupling between the isocurvature and curvature fields. In this model, the probability distribution function of the curvature perturbations consists of a Gaussian function with small superimposed oscillations reflecting the isocurvature axion potential.
Because of their quantum fluctuations, axion fields had a chance to experience field excursions traversing many minima of their potentials during inflation. We study this situation by analyzing the dynamics of an axion-spectator field $\psi$, present during inflation, with a periodic potential given by $v(\psi) = \Lambda^4 [1 - \cos (\psi / f)]$. By assuming that the vacuum expectation value of the field is stabilized at one of its minima, say $\psi = 0$, we compute every $n$-point correlation function of $\psi$ up to first order in $\Lambda^4$ using the in-in formalism. This computation allows us to identify the distribution function describing the probability of measuring $\psi$ at a particular amplitude during inflation. Because $\psi$ is able to tunnel between the barriers of the potential, we find that the probability distribution function consists of a non-Gaussian multimodal distribution such that the probability of measuring $\psi$ at a minimum of $v(\psi)$ different from $\psi=0$ increases with time. As a result, at the end of inflation, different patches of the Universe are characterized by different values of the axion field amplitude, leading to important cosmological phenomenology: (a) Isocurvature fluctuations induced by the axion at the end of inflation could be highly non-Gaussian. (b) If the axion defines the strength of standard model couplings, then one is led to a concrete realization of the multiverse. (c) If the axion corresponds to dark matter, one is led to the possibility that, within our observable Universe, dark matter started with a nontrivial initial condition, implying novel signatures for future surveys.
Future cosmic microwave background polarization experiments will search for evidence of primordial tensor modes at large angular scales, in the multipole range $4 \leq \ell \leq 50.$ Because in that range there is some mild evidence of departures from scale invariance in the power spectrum of primordial curvature perturbations, one may wonder about the possibility of similar deviations appearing in the primordial power spectrum of tensor modes. Here we address this issue and analyze the possible presence of features in the tensor spectrum resulting from the dynamics of primordial fluctuations during inflation. We derive a general, model independent, relation linking features in the spectra of curvature and tensor perturbations. We conclude that even with large deviations from scale invariance in the curvature power spectrum, the tensor spectrum remains scale invariant for all observational purposes.
Braneshop, and
the US National Science Foundation.
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