New cosmic microwave background constraint to primordial gravitational waves |
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Authors: | Smith Tristan L Pierpaoli Elena Kamionkowski Marc |
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Affiliation: | California Institute of Technology, Mail Code 130-33, Pasadena, 91125, USA. |
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Abstract: | Primordial gravitational waves (GWs) with frequencies > or approximately equal to 10(-15) Hz contribute to the radiation density of the Universe at the time of decoupling of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). This affects the CMB and matter power spectra in a manner identical to massless neutrinos, unless the initial density perturbation for the GWs is nonadiabatic, as may occur if such GWs are produced during inflation or some post-inflation phase transition. In either case, current observations provide a constraint to the GW amplitude that competes with that from big-bang nucleosynthesis (BBN), although it extends to much lower frequencies (approximately 10(-15) Hz rather than the approximately 10(-10) Hz from BBN): at 95% confidence level, omega(gw)h(2)
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