No Arabic abstract
We discuss methods based on Principal Component Analysis to constrain the dark energy equation of state using a combination of Type Ia supernovae at low redshift and spectroscopic measurements of varying fundamental couplings at higher redshifts. We discuss the performance of this method when future better-quality datasets are available, focusing on two forthcoming ESO spectrographs - ESPRESSO for the VLT and CODEX for the E-ELT - which include these measurements as a key part of their science cases. These can realize the prospect of a detailed characterization of dark energy properties almost all the way up to redshift 4.
Under the assumption that the variations of parameters of nature and the current acceleration of the universe are related and governed by the evolution of a single scalar field, we show how information can be obtained on the nature of dark energy from observational detection of (or constraints on) cosmological variations of the fine structure constant and the proton-to-electron mass ratio. We also comment on the current observational status, and on the prospects for improvements with future spectrographs such as ESPRESSO and CODEX.
Scalar field dynamics may give rise to a nonzero cosmological variation of fundamental constants. Within different scenarios based on the unification of gauge couplings, the various claimed observations and bounds may be combined in order to trace or restrict the time history of the couplings and masses. If the scalar field is responsible for a dynamical dark energy or quintessence, cosmological information becomes available for its time evolution. Combining this information with the time variation of couplings, one can determine the interaction strength between the scalar and atoms, which may be observed by tests of the Weak Equivalence Principle. We compute bounds on the present rate of coupling variation from experiments testing the differential accelerations for bodies with equal mass and different composition and compare the sensitivity of various methods. In particular, we discuss two specific models of scalar evolution: crossover quintessence and growing neutrino models.
We discuss the existence of an acceleration scale in galaxies and galaxy clusters. The presence of the same acceleration scale found at very different scales and in very different astrophysical objects strongly supports the existence of a fundamental acceleration scale governing the observed gravitational physics. We also comment on the implication of such a fundamental acceleration scale on the problem of dark matter. We discuss the relevance of the fundamental acceleration for the nature of dark matter as well as for structure formation to be explored in future numerical simulations.
This paper uses the beta function formalism to extend the analysis of quintessence cosmological parameters to the logarithmic and exponential dark energy potentials. The previous paper (Thompson 2018) demonstrated the formalism using power and inverse power potentials. The essentially identical evolution of the Hubble parameter for all of the quintessence cases and LambdaCDM is attributed to the flatness of the quintessence dark energy potentials in the dark energy dominated era. The Hubble parameter is therefore incapable of discriminating between static and dynamic dark energy. Unlike the other three potentials considered in the two papers the logarithmic dark energy potential requires a numerical integration in the formula for the superpotential rather than being an analytic function. The dark energy equation of state and the fundamental constants continue to be good discriminators between static and dynamical dark energy. A new analysis of quintessence with all four of the potentials relative the swampland conjectures indicates that the conjecture on the change in the scalar field is satisfied but that the conjecture on the change of the potential is not.
Varying fundamental constants (VFC) [e.g., the fine-structure constant, $alpha_{rm EM}$] can arise in numerous extended cosmologies. Through their effect on the decoupling of baryons and photons during last scattering and reionisation, these models can be directly constrained using measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature and polarization anisotropies. Previous investigations focused mainly on time-independent changes to the values of fundamental constants. Here we generalize to time-dependent variations. Instead of directly studying various VFC parameterizations, we perform a model-independent principal component analysis (PCA), directly using an eigenmode decomposition of the varying constant during recombination. After developing the formalism, we use Planck 2018 data to obtain new VFC limits, showing that three independent VFC modes can be constrained at present. No indications for significant departures from the standard model are found with Planck data. Cosmic variance limited modes are also compared and simple forecasts for The Simons Observatory are carried out, showing that in the future improvements of the current constraints by a factor of $simeq 3$ can be anticipated. Our modes focus solely on VFC at redshifts $zgeq 300$. This implies that they do not capture some of the degrees of freedom relating to the reionisation era. This aspect provides important new insights into the possible origin of the Hubble tension, hinting that indeed a combined modification of recombination and reionisation physics could be at work. An extended PCA, covering both recombination and reionisation simultaneously, could shed more light on this question, as we emphasize here.