No Arabic abstract
We use the WISE-2MASS infrared galaxy catalog matched with Pan-STARRS1 (PS1) galaxies to search for a supervoid in the direction of the Cosmic Microwave Background Cold Spot. Our imaging catalog has median redshift $zsimeq 0.14$, and we obtain photometric redshifts from PS1 optical colours to create a tomographic map of the galaxy distribution. The radial profile centred on the Cold Spot shows a large low density region, extending over 10s of degrees. Motivated by previous Cosmic Microwave Background results, we test for underdensities within two angular radii, $5^circ$, and $15^circ$. The counts in photometric redshift bins show significantly low densities at high detection significance, $gtrsim 5 sigma$ and $gtrsim 6 sigma$, respectively, for the two fiducial radii. The line-of-sight position of the deepest region of the void is $zsimeq 0.15-0.25$. Our data, combined with an earlier measurement by Granett et al. 2010, are consistent with a large $R_{rm void}=(220 pm 50) h^{-1}Mpc $ supervoid with $delta_{m} simeq -0.14 pm 0.04$ centered at $z=0.22pm0.03$. Such a supervoid, constituting at least a $simeq 3.3sigma$ fluctuation in a Gaussian distribution of the $Lambda CDM$ model, is a plausible cause for the Cold Spot.
We use a WISE-2MASS-Pan-STARRS1 galaxy catalog to search for a supervoid in the direction of the Cosmic Microwave Background Cold Spot. We obtain photometric redshifts using our multicolor data set to create a tomographic map of the galaxy distribution. The radial density profile centred on the Cold Spot shows a large low density region, extending over 10s of degrees. Motivated by previous Cosmic Microwave Background results, we test for underdensities within two angular radii, $5^circ$, and $15^circ$. Our data, combined with an earlier measurement by Granett et al 2010, are consistent with a large $R_{rm void}=(192 pm 15)h^{-1} Mpc $ $(2sigma)$ supervoid with $delta simeq -0.13 pm 0.03$ centered at $z=0.22pm0.01$. Such a supervoid, constituting a $sim3.5 sigma$ fluctuation in the $Lambda CDM$ model, is a plausible cause for the Cold Spot.
Standard inflationary hot big bang cosmology predicts small fluctuations in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) with isotropic Gaussian statistics. All measurements support the standard theory, except for a few anomalies discovered in the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe maps and confirmed recently by the Planck satellite. The Cold Spot is one of the most significant of such anomalies, and the leading explanation of it posits a large void that imprints this extremely cold area via the linear Integrated Sachs-Wolfe (ISW) effect due to the decay of gravitational potentials over cosmic time, or via the Rees-Sciama (RS) effect due to late-time non-linear evolution. Despite several observational campaigns targeting the Cold Spot region, to date no suitably large void was found at higher redshifts $z > 0.3$. Here we report the detection of an $R =(192 pm 15) h^{-1}Mpc$ size supervoid of depth $delta = -0.13 pm 0.03$, and centred at redshift $z = 0.22$. This supervoid, possibly the largest ever found, is large enough to significantly affect the CMB via the non-linear RS effect, as shown in our Lemaitre-Tolman-Bondi framework. This discovery presents the first plausible explanation for any of the physical CMB anomalies, and raises the possibility that local large-scale structure could be responsible for other anomalies as well.
The alignment of the CMB Cold Spot and the Eridanus supervoid suggests a physical connection between these two relatively rare objects. We use galaxy cata-logues with photometric (2MPZ) and spectroscopic (6dF) redshift measurements, supplemented by low-redshift compilations of cosmic voids, in order to improve the 3D mapping of the matter density in the Eridanus constellation. We find evidence for a supervoid with a significant elongation in the line-of-sight, effectively spanning the total redshift range $z<0.3$. Our tomographic imaging reveals important substructure in the Eridanus supervoid, with a potential interpretation of a long, fully connected system of voids. We improve the analysis by extending the line-of-sight measurements into the antipodal direction that interestingly crosses the Northern Local Supervoid at the lowest redshifts. Then it intersects very rich superclusters like Hercules and Corona Borealis, in the region of the Coma and Sloan Great Walls, as a possible compensation for the large-scale matter deficit of Eridanus. We find that large-scale structure measurements are consistent with a central matter underdensity $delta_0 approx -0.25$, projected transverse radius $r_{0}^{perp}approx 195$ Mpc/h with an extra deepening in the centre, and line-of-sight radius $r_{0}^{parallel}approx500$ Mpc/h, i.e. an ellipsoidal supervoid. The expected integrated Sachs-Wolfe imprint of such an elongated supervoid is at the $Delta T_{rm ISW} approx -40 mu K$ level, thus inappropriate to accounting for the Cold Spot pattern in the CMB.
Understanding the observed Cold Spot (CS) (temperature of ~ -150 mu K at its centre) on the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) is an outstanding problem. Explanations vary from assuming it is just a > 3 sigma primordial Gaussian fluctuation to the imprint of a supervoid via the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe and Rees-Sciama (ISW+RS) effects. Since single spherical supervoids cannot account for the full profile, the ISW+RS of multiple line-of-sight voids is studied here to mimic the structure of the cosmic web. Two structure configurations are considered. The first, through simulations of 20 voids, produces a central mean temperature of ~-50 mu K. In this model the central CS temperature lies at ~ 2 sigma but fails to explain the CS hot ring. An alternative multi-void model (using more pronounced compensated voids) produces much smaller temperature profiles, but contains a prominent hot ring. Arrangements containing closely placed voids at low redshift are found to be particularly well suited to produce CS-like profiles. We then measure the significance of the CS if CS-like profiles (which are fitted to the ISW+RS of multi-void scenarios) are removed. The CS tension with the LCDM model can be reduced dramatically for an array of temperature profiles smaller than the CS itself.
We report the results of the 2dF-VST ATLAS Cold Spot galaxy redshift survey (2CSz) based on imaging from VST ATLAS and spectroscopy from 2dF AAOmega over the core of the CMB Cold Spot. We sparsely surveyed the inner 5$^{circ}$ radius of the Cold Spot to a limit of $i_{AB} le 19.2$, sampling $sim7000$ galaxies at $z<0.4$. We have found voids at $z=$ 0.14, 0.26 and 0.30 but they are interspersed with small over-densities and the scale of these voids is insufficient to explain the Cold Spot through the $Lambda$CDM ISW effect. Combining with previous data out to $zsim1$, we conclude that the CMB Cold Spot could not have been imprinted by a void confined to the inner core of the Cold Spot. Additionally we find that our control field GAMA G23 shows a similarity in its galaxy redshift distribution to the Cold Spot. Since the GAMA G23 line-of-sight shows no evidence of a CMB temperature decrement we conclude that the Cold Spot may have a primordial origin rather than being due to line-of-sight effects.