Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
1998-05-04
Phys.Rev.Lett. 81 (1998) 2004-2007
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
4 pages, RevTeX, two included figures. Final version accepted by Physical Review Letters
Scientific paper
10.1103/PhysRevLett.81.2004
Hydrogen atoms in the Universe that initially formed at redshift z = 1100 were reionized at 5 < z < 60. It is likely that this transition proceeded through a mixed phase of partial ionization. We develop an analytic approach to calculating the effect on the cosmic microwave background (CMB) of Thomson scattering off this inhomogeneous distribution of free electrons. We study two models of the reionization process, one of which associates ionized patches with overdense regions of the smoothed density field. We find the generated anisotropy to have a power spectrum which peaks at angular scales corresponding to the extent of the ionized regions, and has a width that reflects the correlations between them. There is considerable uncertainty in the amplitude, which depends on how efficiently collapsed objects can reionize the surrounding medium. We calculate the effect of neglecting inhomogeneous reionization in the determination of cosmological parameters from high resolution CMB maps and find that it may be a significant source of systematic error.
Dodelson Scott
Knox Lloyd
Scoccimarro Roman
No associations
LandOfFree
The Impact of Inhomogeneous Reionization on Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.
If you have personal experience with The Impact of Inhomogeneous Reionization on Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and The Impact of Inhomogeneous Reionization on Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-688117